Steve’s Blog

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PS: You can make your own alcohol stove too. I have several posts about this. Try a search in the bottom left hand corner for ‘stove’

15/08/2020: If pedophilia is just sexuality then burying them all is just gardening! (Anon)

15/08/2020: Hard to believe that hiking isn’t racist: https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2020/05/the-unbearable-lightness-of-being-liberal.php but is it more racist than jogging: https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2020/05/which-is-more-racist-hiking-or-jogging.php And now camping is too: https://www.thepiratescove.us/2020/08/11/la-times-camping-is-totally-racist-you-know/

15/08/2020: Whether you like Clive Palmer or not the WA Govt’s law cancelling the rule of (property) law is just so awfully undemocratic: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/blogs/andrew-bolt/clive-palmer-on-the-thieving-western-australian-government/news-story/9fd0792694808371f0d86579b93180ed

14/08/2020: Asparagus Dreaming: Della: Today’s job was the asparagus bed: This is a perennial crop, and having planted the crowns about 30 years ago, we have little to do each year other than cut off the dead fronds each winter.

Gardening guides say that you can do this once the fronds turn yellow in autumn, but that is hard work, I found, as each thick frond has to be cut by hand with secateurs. So over the years I have put the job off later and later until I discovered that August is the perfect time. By then the stems are dead enough to come away with the gentlest tug, and so the work is minimised.

So here are today’s before and after pics, along with the first taste of asparagus for the season. Another reward in leaving the bed looking untidy all through the cooler months is the early shoots that are waiting to surprise me beneath the bleak canopy. Tonight’s dinner accompaniment!

Most impressive. I wish I could do a ‘show and tell’ for my day’s work on the fence, but at the end it still just looks like a fence even though I am exhausted! An asparagus bed (like a good fence) will pretty much last a lifetime. I will not have to build either again anyway.

14/08/2020: ‘Animal Farm’ aside, George Orwell can still teach us a lot – an instructive essay: https://quillette.com/2020/08/08/george-orwell-and-the-struggle-against-inevitable-bias/

14/08/2020: ‘We shall defeat them by proving once more that a free individual living in a free community with a free tomorrow in front of him (or her) is worth a nation of slaves’. (Menzies) But is Victoria today still a ‘free society’? And is its loss worth the ‘gain? It is all becoming increasingly questionable: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/08/australia-how-have-you-let-it-come-to-this/

14/08/2020: ‘The tragic thing about Kamala Harris’s selection is that the DNC picked a woman of Indian and Jamaican parentage to be a generic double for an African-American.’ Talk about wearing your black face on your sleeve: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/08/14/resorting-to-black-face/ Remember when she believed Biden was a dirty old man: https://thefederalist.com/2020/08/11/flashback-kamala-harris-said-she-believed-bidens-rape-accusers/

13/08/2020: The Best Hiking/Hunting Shoe Ever: I received my new Topo Hydraventure 2 shoes from Injinji about a month ago. The new model is even better than the old one.

Look at that tread.

310 grams in US size 9.5: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/08/13/the-best-hiking-hunting-shoe-ever/

13/08/2020: 78 Years Later Teddy gets the VC. I can’t imagine what ‘judges’ up to now expected people to be doing in order to ‘win’ it. Teddy should have ‘tried harder’ I guess.: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/08/her-majesty-the-queen-approves-award-of-victoria-cross-to-the-late-teddy-sheean.html

13/08/2020: Not so cool then - Marijuana use during pregnancy linked to autism in babies. Wow: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/08/10/health/weed-marijuana-pregnancy-autism-link-wellness/index.html

13/08/2020: Dementia Joe and his commie kewpie golliwog Kamala who accused him of groping her earlier –if you remember – not only the first ‘black’, ‘woman’ but the first ‘Asian’ too. She is everything, just ‘ticks all the boxes’ and should be a big winner for the far-left, far-out Dems I don’t think. I foresee a big Trump win in November. She is so far-Left she makes Bernie Sanders look like a Republican – and if Biden wins (since he is clearly mentally incompetent) she will be President: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/08/kamala-harris/ Mind you the Dems are up to big-time dirty tricks with their postal vote push to completely subvert the democratic process and just be able to appoint their own President whatever the people may want. Read about it here: https://richardsonpost.com/brian-c-joondeph/17958/democrats-pushing-mail-in-ballots/ & https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/08/12/kamala-harris-meanest-most-horrible-most-disrespectful-senator/ & https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/08/12/flashback-sen-kamala-harris-supported-eliminating-senate-filibuster-to-pass-green-new-deal/

12/08/2020: Prometheus has a lot to answer for – but Boy, have we ever been sitting around the campfire for a long while: https://www.livescience.com/when-did-humans-discover-fire.html

12/08/2020: Sweden: What herd immunity looks like. With plenty of Hydroxy, Zinc and Ivomec - and now a (Russian) vaccine we can re-open the economy; let’s get on with it: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/08/columbia-doctor-explains-herd-immunity-and-what-life-could-be-like-here.html

12/08/2020: Beirut in Slo-mo. Wow! Please send more Ammonium Nitrate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=67&v=SkIYjNGiaoA&feature=emb_title

11/08/2020: Aricxi $30 Tent Review: It took quite a while to get here what with Covid 19, but it came a couple of days ago. I am as pleased with it as I thought I would be when I mentioned it in this post back in April. The tent is very well made and well thought out. For most people it will be big enough for two people and will certainly be a palace for one. It really does only weigh 320 grams including the guys!

I will make a few improvements to mine. they are all things you could do with a little bit of competent hand sewing which will make the tent even better. I use the word ‘tent’. this has been the normal word for a folding ‘roof’ you sleep under for thousands of years. I do not understand the absurd distinction between tent/tarp some wish to draw insisting that if it does not have a floor or bug protection it is somehow not a ‘tent’. You can always simply add these features, or dispense with them… https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/08/11/aricxi-30-tent-review/

11/08/2020: ‘Jack the Dancer’ has been around a long time: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/59291

11/08/2020: Homeostasis (thermo-regulation) is one of a mammal’s most interesting (defining) features. It is also an important feature of the climate whose temperature has varied so little over such a long time that any rational person would long ago have concluded that the earth has a thermostat – just that we don’t clearly understand how it works: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/08/09/undeniable-truths/

11/08/2020: Aged care: We spend billions on this heartwarming phrase and are currently spending millions on an enquiry which has so far found that we have got just one of the words correct. Apparently there is nothing strange about this sentence I heard on the news this morning ‘Leaving ‘loved ones’ locked in their rooms for days seeing no-one, not even staff’. All this ‘care’ to protect us from a virus perhaps? Please can I just have ready access to a couple of small blue pills so I can peacefully exit this life at a time of my chosing without having to prove that I am in unbearable pain in order to ‘qualify’…they don’t even have to be blue really. I saw an ad on the tele the other night telling me I could ‘save’ $6000 on a new kitchen ‘stove’ - they are now called ‘ranges’ because you can charge several thousand more dollars for the extra letter. I think $500 is quite enough for a simple device to cook your dinner on – there are plenty of perfectly good ones for free at the scrap metal dealers or the tip anyway. Instead of spending all that money on a stove I think spending just a small amount on a kitchen window seat so there is somewhere warm and comfy within the centre of the family for the grandparents to sit and enjoy their declining years would be much better really. When I was a small child an old man (Mr Shields) lived in a small tin hut (a garden shed really) in the paddock next to us for years. My mother used to tell me not to ‘bother Mr Shields’ who curiously never seemed to mind being ‘bothered’ by a small curious venturesome boy – so I thankfully ignored her. We enjoyed many happy times together yarning and having mugs of billy tea on a log beneath the gum trees next to his small creek. When we were in Nepal last year we stayed a couple of nights at the Benkar Guest House a day up the track from Luckla. The inn-keeper Niwa’s mother used to sit in her kitchen window most of the day smiling and watching people passing by, listening to birds outside calling, gazing at the wild river churning in its bed below, looking up at the fantastic mountains, chatting to her daughter as she cooked meals for the guests, etc. Such a ‘deprived’ retirement really after having built the hotel and all its surrounding walls, buildings etc with her own hands having carried the materials on her own back many miles to get them there – and having raised half a dozen healthy children in such a lovely remote spot…I rest my case. https://www.heraldsun.com.au/blogs/andrew-bolt/mccrann-on-the-coronavirus-witchhunters/news-story/5a14dd4de7e313c4910e725f0d4e3832

10/08/2020: ‘Auction of the Souls’. Was a terrifying film about the (Turkish) Armenian genocide - in case you need to be reminded what will be you fate too under a future Islamic caliphate. Extermination is the sole purpose after all of all the Islamic immigration the West has been having: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TT_JTcvV0OY & http://www.genocide-museum.am/eng/online_exhibition_6.php This is a later interview with the heroine of the film, Aurora Mardiganian, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTlqnStssEA

10/08/2020: Are Fake News Polls Hiding a Potential Trump Landslide? I certainly hope so. Convincingly argued and evidenced anyway: https://richardsonpost.com/brian-c-joondeph/17917/fake-polls-trump-landslide/

10/08/2020: A lot to take in I know but please read on (and open the links): Terry McCrann on hydroxychloroquine: ‘After the unrelenting tidal waves of Trump Derangement Syndrome-driven media and medical expertism attacking the drug, the Swiss which had been using it widely in late May banned its use. I have no information on whether they defined it as a “poison”. What happened? What’s called the “Case Fatality Ratio Index (CFRI)” for the virus rocketed — and I mean, tripled. So, just 13 days later, the Swiss revoked the ban. What happened then? The CFRI collapsed back to its prior HCQ-using levels. Bluntly, fewer — many fewer — people died. Apparently, the drug that’s a poison down under worked to save lives in Switzerland’. We just can’t keep on with these economy destroying lockdowns either. As Trump says, we must ‘open up’: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt-lockdown-will-kill-victorians-but-not-from-coronavirus/news-story/94a6b0945911b57687cb6bb9bab6a6a1 Can we (afford to) continue to destroy small business (lives) like this: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/08/05/dominoes-how-to-destroy-a-nation-australian-edition/ After all Covid risks may have been over-estimated by about a factor of 10: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/08/04/npr-mounting-evidence-suggests-covid19-not-as-deadly-as-thought/ It seems after all that Sweden was right to try to live with the virus. Now that we have many effective treatments (and it is out of control in Vic anyway) maybe we need to do the same: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/27/why-herd-immunity-to-covid-19-is-reached-much-earlier-than-thought-update/

09/08/2020: New insights into photosynthesis are helping explain where all the CO2 went: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/08/from-viv-forbes-how-to-sterilise-the-great-barrier-reef.html

09/08/2020: The marine life food chain depends on filter feeders; nutrients are enormously important...Wonderful lateral thinking from Viv Forbes: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/08/from-viv-forbes-how-to-sterilise-the-great-barrier-reef.html

09/08/2020: American comedian George Carlin, ‘Political correctness is fascism pretending to be manners’ – as we bid an (un)fond farewell to free speech: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/free-speech/2020/08/an-age-of-wretched-and-rotten-rhetoric/

08/08/2020: In the name of God Dan, go! If only Scott could take over Victoria: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/08/07/friday-fun-can-the-governor-general-abolish-victoria/

08/08/2020: Expunging Discriminatory Nomenclature in Ornithology. When do we want it? Now: https://rosebyanyothernameblog.wordpress.com/2020/08/05/the-name-that-cant-be-spoken/

08/08/2020: Countries which have been using hydroxychloroquine to fight the virus have reduced their death toll by 80%. Well done banning it Dan: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/08/countries-that-use-hydroxychloroquine-may-have-80-lower-covid-death-rates/ & https://www.archyde.com/efficacy-of-hydroxychloroquine-confirmed-on-3451-italian-patients-30-reduction-in-mortality/?fbclid=IwAR0J5J8kz6mTtxUIrKn1tWfuZizIO6RUu_ncA_71ntlSj5vP1KqtbaoQsn0

07/08/2020: A Poignant 76^th Anniversary - The Warsaw Uprising: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/08/02/76th-anniversary-the-heroes-of-warsaw/

07/08/2020: Charming people: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/ominous-signal-as-isis-urges-fresh-attacks-on-australia/news-story/0942e5f46649bf704fff10d7001b82ab

07/08/2020: Some interesting reflections about the working class, a vanishing species alas; having worked with my hands most of my life without succumbing to addiction or criminality I find it a bit outré though: https://quillette.com/2020/08/02/my-life-pouring-concrete/

06/08/2020: DIY 33 Gram Roll Up SS Hobo Stove: I am over carrying heavy stoves – and fuel. This one will do me. I will produce a version in titanium which will weigh about half what this one does in stainless steel, so under 20 grams! And no fuel to carry. Good enough? https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/08/06/diy-33-gram-roll-up-ss-hobo-stove/

06/08/2020: I suspect this is right: This is the issue that will see Trump re-elected overwhelmingly, ‘The first thing Americans want from their government is safety, defense of their property and lives. By a 20% margin black Americans support the police.’ https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/08/portland-what-does-it-mean-david-horowitz/

06/08/2020: As usual, so well stated Anthony Dillon, ‘This shared reluctance has allowed the problems that have been facing Aboriginal children for decades to fester. But these children are Australian children, therefore all of us, both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, are entitled to an opinion. Aboriginal affairs is everyone’s business. All Australians are entitled to say “these are our children, and it is our moral duty to save them”. Viewing Aboriginal people as a group separate from other Australians, as we have been tirelessly encouraged to do, has only ever failed. It may generate incomes, status, university careers and guest spots for the gatekeepers on ABC talk shows, but it is quite literally killing those who most need help.’ Please read the full article. We all need to own this issue: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/bennelong-papers/2020/08/a-moral-duty-in-black-and-white/

06/08/2020: After such an ‘unusual’ year I am hoping we can retire the word ‘unprecedented’ which I have always found rather pretentious. Now I find it impossibly repetitive and jarring. I am hoping to not hear it again for a long time.

05/08/2020: They keep ‘discovering’ the world’s tallest trees - and ignoring the even taller ones which used to exist in Victoria: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/environment/2019/04/worlds-tallest-tropical-tree-discovered-climbed-borneo/?cmpid=org=ngp::mc=crm-email::src=ngp::cmp=editorial::add=Compass_20200801&rid=401F76E6763B0B094694A8EC247EC256 & https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2015/01/20/our-largest-trees/

05/08/2020: Time to remember Martin Luther King – how morally and intellectually different (and better) he was than the present day cohort of ‘black rights’ advocates: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/bennelong-papers/2020/08/the-scorned-wisdom-of-martin-luther-king/

05/08/2020: Covid Cure: Maybe you didn’t fancy taking sheep drench (as I recommended back in January) but now the Prof Thomas Borody who cured ulcers recommends it too. I suggest you get yours today before Dan bans it too: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/coronavirus/how-a-2-head-lice-treatment-could-treat-covid19-patients/news-story/cb6681303329fdb27f390eaa3179fe28 (Paywalled - try Google) NB you need Zinc and an antibiotic too. PS: We can’t keep on living like this. We have to try out the obvious cures on a larger scale instead of banning them. This is concerning this morning too: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/08/05/seriously/

04/08/2020: Virtually no danger to people from low-level radiation. This should be a big boost to the nuclear power industry which ought to be seen as the solution to cheap clean energy: http://www.thegwpf.com/another-nail-in-the-lnt-coffin/

04/08/2020: Well, they are criminals. The knowingly infected couple who recently traveled to Orbost and infected lots of people are criminals. If someone dies surely the act constitutes manslaughter, and is attempted manslaughter anyway. (It is certainly ‘conduct endangering life’ under section 22 of the Crimes Act 1958 (Vic). This crime carries a maximum 10-year jail term.) Charge them with that. Gaol them without parole. Clearly they can’t be trusted – until the crisis is over. It will be a salutary lesson for others. Hanging had two positive outcomes: removing the scum from the community (and their genes) permanently and ‘pour encourageur les autres’ as the saying goes. And yes, I never thought it should be abolished as I have said many times. I think Dan Andrews should be hanged for example. Over a hundred people dead because of his negligence already (and an economy destroyed). How bad do you have to be before you pay the ultimate price? Similarly Rudd and Gillard murdered over 2,000 boat people who are on the bottom of the Indian Ocean somewhere. Off with their heads too! – as an example to others, if nothing else: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/justin-quill-time-to-treat-nonisolators-as-criminals/news-story/0b7e73961c44d64dbf2e9a7a2057ea7f & of course it is Andrews’ fault: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/james-campbell/if-stage-four-doesnt-work-there-may-not-be-a-plan-b/news-story/37893ff1d7909f70cdecffc030e30141

04/08/2020: Look at it this way: One of these states is not like the others, one of these state leaders just doesn't belong.

Or this: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/08/reader-stuart-hamish-rips-into-daniel-andrews-apart-but-together-strapline-knocked-off-from-this-us-.html

03/08/2020: Dan’s Lockdown is such a fraud: It is just a continuation of his ‘rewarding failure’ policy which has done so much to get us to where we are now. All along he has refused/failed to punish those who do the wrong thing (eg refuse testing in hotel quarantine –remember that? Or break quarantine – remember that? Or insist on protesting in the streets – remember that? A third of those infected are still not at home when phoned or called upon – and nothing is done to punish them! Remember that? It is just so much easier now to punish those who do the right thing. And now I may not (for example) drive across Gippsland (where I live) when I would neither stop nor see anyone - to spend a few days hiking or hunting completely by myself! As if that measure would do any good to circumvent this virus! I doubt his hugely expensive and disruptive lockdown will do any good either unless it is accompanied by a strong desire to punish the evildoers. His own side! Yeah, sure! As a reminder here is my post from ‘08/07/2020: This is all the fault of incompetent commie clown Andrews. Needless to say I said you should never vote for him/them. Still though all the people who did the right thing are in lock-down those faux ‘Australians’ who were paid to return by us (when they were told to return in March), and all those who refused to be tested and all the commies who broke restrictions so they could have racist protests are to blame – and Andrews abetted all of them. He still refuses to compulsorily test just as he will fail to keep the same type of people locked down, so the virus will be impossible to control. Victoria may as well give up on it right now and just let the people who are going to die of it do so. No doubt it is still difficult to access the cure as well. Great. (ie Hydroxychloroquine 200 mg twice a day + Azithromycin 500 mg + Zinc sulfate 220 mg once a day for 5 days – suggest you stock up. Clive Palmer ensured there is an adequate supply) https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt-how-victoria-can-flatten-virus-curve-for-good/news-story/35ac05bc181981cda8a388bf5e37323e

03/08/2020: ‘Twitter, Facebook and YouTube banned a video of doctors promoting hydroxychloroquine, a drug that some studies and experts say can stop people dying of the coronavirus’. So not just Dan Andrews then. A whole cohort of Lefties wants you to die of the virus when you would not die from the ‘cure’ even if it did not work (though there is very good evidence that it does - which you may not now see!) Shall we just add that death toll to the tally of two hundred million or so killed by these people (100 million from malaria as a result of the unnecessary, concocted - and now overturned ban on DDT alone). 100 million from their murderous regimes. All these people are indescribably evil: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/blogs/andrew-bolt/ban-on-hydroxchloroquine-video-is-lethally-dangerous/news-story/f9dea977b525faeb3708e1b3e241e949

03/08/2020: Some young people are crazy: in the middle of this pandemic, after ten o’clock last night a young man had climbed over our locked front gate ignoring the ‘Beware of the Dog’ sign, walked the fifty yards in the dark up our driveway then tapped on the window pane right next to me at my desk where I was working on my most recent post (A Moondarra Maelstrom) looking for a lost puppy! The night before someone had broken into a neighbouring property, stolen a car and done ‘wheelies’ all up and down the road! As a consequence of that I had mentioned to Della (and then to the young man) the desirability of having a loaded gun leaning up against the table at all times so one could fire a shot or two ‘over their bows’ so to speak just to get their attention! This young fellow was lucky I had not done so already as he gave me a very big shock I can tell you! I suspect it is not legal to use a firearm for this purpose anyway, so I had not. Our dogs did not bark as they and Della had gone to bed. Some help they are when you need them. No-one has climbed over our locked front gate since I installed it over ten years ago, and no-one has ever walked in to our house in the dark and knocked on the door in thirty years! I am not ready for a repetition of this experience I can tell you. We have not had a very restful night’s sleep. There will be an electric wire on the top of the gate next time he passes. PS: If he had read the Facebook message correctly about someone having found his lost puppy in our road he would have seen their contact details and not gone door to door in the dark frightening the life out of people. I mean climbing over a locked gate is breaking and entering, a serious enough crime. Multiple child-raising failures there in him I feel.

02/08/2020: A Moondarra Maelstrom: We took a break from building the fox-proof fence this afternoon to have a stroll on the Wirilda Track which snakes along the beautiful little Tyers River North of Morwell. For many years it has been the Latrobe Valley's principal fresh water supply. It was a lovely late afternoon deep in the Tyers Valley. Just on sunset we came to the bottom of the dam which was overflowing powerfully giving us some wonderful views of its spectacular waterfall: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/08/02/a-moondarra-maelstrom/

02/08/2020: Duh! Hedonism Leads to Happiness – please send wine: https://www.media.uzh.ch/en/Press-Releases/2020/Hedonism.html

02/08/2020: These quite mad ‘dark emus’ are wholly ignorant of farming. For example, they think this, ‘The colonists ignored Aboriginal methods and brought their own, which were poorly suited to the landscape…We can only assume it was a combination of ignorance and cultural blindness, because it is clear that the land was well managed prior to colonists, and degraded in such a short period of time after their arrival.’ Apparently an ‘agricultural policy’ which turned Australia from a fertile paradise into a notorious desert only able to (barely and meanly) support c 300,000 people is preferable to our agriculture which sustains over 100 million people (world-wide) with a very fine diet indeed – and yet allows for a richer wilderness than anything the aborigines left behind. What utter poppycock these people spout (and supported by the public trough): https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/bennelong-papers/2020/07/bruce-pascoes-tribe-dines-on-young-minds/

02/08/2020: Our State Government is more than shambolic. There ought to be a mechanism for dismissing them and appointing a caretaker government until such times as elections can be held in such an emergency as this: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/rita-panahi/rita-panahiabsurd-lockdown-rules-wont-save-us-from-incompetence/news-story/c5892ee19690a6bf9cceeafa1abfee51

01/08/2020: Della: Swallows: Yesterday Steve saw some of our swallows return for the season. Sadly, one small member of the flock made it bravely across the world to our verandah home and lay down to die of exhaustion. It was small, very young and so light - no doubt not quite old and strong enough for the journey. I gently buried it next to one of my roses, to no doubt feed a host of insects that will in turn feed her family flock.
And so my mind turned to A.D.Hope's "The Death of the Bird"... and to that morning's news of the death of one of our daughter's childhood friends, and then to other recent deaths that have touched us, and so to all the suffering of those dealing with death during this pandemic.
"The Death of the Bird" has some very poignant lines: Not comforting, no sugar-coating, just some raw insight into the way things are.
It was not happy contemplation, but necessary sorting of my thoughts.
Hopefully some time in the paddock fencing with Steve today will lift my small bout of melancholy.
I recommend the poem, especially the 2nd half.

The Death of the Bird

For every bird there is this last migration:
Once more the cooling year kindles her heart;
With a warm passage to the summer station
Love pricks the course in lights across the chart.

Year after year a speck on the map, divided
By a whole hemisphere, summons her to come;
Season after season, sure and safely guided,
Going away she is also coming home.

And being home, memory becomes a passion
With which she feeds her brood and straws her nest,
Aware of ghosts that haunt the heart’s possession
And exiled love mourning within the breast.

The sands are green with a mirage of valleys;
The palm-tree casts a shadow not its own;
Down the long architrave of temple or palace
Blows a cool air from moorland scarps of stone.

And day by day the whisper of love grows stronger;
That delicate voice, more urgent with despair,
Custom and fear constraining her no longer,
Drives her at last on the waste leagues of air.

A vanishing speck in those inane dominions,
Single and frail, uncertain of her place,
Alone in the bright host of her companions,
Lost in the blue unfriendliness of space,

She feels it close now, the appointed season:
The invisible thread is broken as she flies;
Suddenly, without warning, without reason,
The guiding spark of instinct winks and dies.

Try as she will, the trackless world delivers
No way, the wilderness of light no sign,
The immense and complex map of hills and rivers
Mocks her small wisdom with its vast design.

And darkness rises from the eastern valleys,
And the winds buffet her with their hungry breath,
And the great earth, with neither grief nor malice,
Receives the tiny burden of her death.

01/08/2020: How long do butterflies and moths live? Longer than I thought anyway: https://www.butterfliesandmoths.org/faq/how-long-do-butterflies-and-moths-live

01/08/2020: A Phone in Your Fob: If you work outdoors doing physical work as I have done most of my life you will realise that most smart phones are quite unsuitable. It is just about impossible to carry them in such a way that they will not break. I used to carry my small (4″) Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini in a padded pouch suspended from my belt but I still broke screens/phones.

The fob pocket was invented just for the purpose of protecting a pocket watch in these circumstances – so you need a phone which will fit in your fob. Fortunately there are a few such.

This is my Atom in a pair of very worn farm jeans. As you can see from the attached mud in the lanyard hole it has done some pretty hard work around the farm helping build fences , deliver lambs, rebuild vehicles & etc. There is a wonderful new model. Read More: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/07/31/a-phone-in-your-fob/

01/08/2020: The Donald: He really is a nice man – and alert, intelligent sensitive, good-humoured…Pretty much everything Biden is not. No wonder Biden won’t debate him, and the ‘fake news’ spends so much effort trying to demonise him. This is a marvelous interview. It will change your mind: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1260&v=vRWr9dI8-Jw&feature=emb_title

01/08/2020: Atishoo Akbar: Yes, I think this is shameful too (especially after the outbreak in Melbourne (and who was responsible for it). Instead of outlawing Islam and ejecting its every adherent from the country (something we will have to do eventually, believe me – if we are to survive), exceptions are made for Islam that could not be made for Mothers’ Day, Easter, Anzac Day VE Day, etc, etc. How much must we kow-tow to this vile creed? Not at all! Never! https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/07/nsw-government-gives-auburn-mosque-coronavirus-exemption-400-people-allowed-in-for-eid-al-adha.html

31/07/2020: Latest from the Gulag: Hydroxychloroquine: We have a safe harmless ‘cure’ which has been used by hundreds of millions of people for over 70 years yet just when we need it, Dan bans it, but forces old people to die in misery. He has already killed nearly a hundred Victorians. He should be arraigned for mass murder: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/07/anyone-know-why-this-order-is-in-place.html PS: You have to take it in association with zinc though: its effect is in transporting zinc within the cell to kill viruses. This is why it appeared ineffective in some trials. the antibiotic is because so many people succumb to secondary (lung) infections. Ivomec also seems to have proven effective anti-viral properties which improve your chances of survival. as a prophylactic you need to keep up your Vitamin D3 and Zinc levels. these are your best chance of being able to throw off (lung) infections you encounter.

31/07/2020: The Don going in to bat for free speech; the power of these tech companies certainly needs to be constrained: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/censorship-is-weapon-1-trump-orders-online-tech-giants-to-stop/

31/07/2020: Government. You wanted it. I have long lamented that I did not but…we have three levels of Government in Australia (at least two too many); we have over a million public servants, too many of them paid over $100K per year - more than twice what I have ever earned by hard work. We also have literally millions at the moment who are being paid (handsomely) not to work, while Della and I struggle to get our new farm fence finished against this year’s lambing season alone – but are now supposed to wear masks while we do if we are on the outside of the fence. The country also has 10,619 ‘recovered’ Covid 19 cases (as of this morning). Way back in February I argued that we needed to ‘manpower’ these people into treating people in the gravest danger of the virus. Nonetheless hundreds of elderly people have been allowed to suffer without any care at all (and many to die) in nursing homes in Victoria. I said at the time that the death penalty was abolished that it was a very bad decision. Why have I spent over fifty years of my life feeding and clothing such people?

30/07/2020: ‘Green steel’ at four times the price. Just like other idiotic green policies, this one should also be righteously rejected – when will they declare an ‘open season’ on these harmful idiots? https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/28/david-bidstrup-guest-post-green-steel/

30/07/2020: So, an ‘asylum seeker’ burned down Nantes’ Cathedral. Who could have guessed? I hope he is hanged, drawn and quartered – at least sent back to whatever squalid hell-hole he crawled out of after serving a rather nasty sentence anyway: https://www.fr24news.com/a/2020/07/rwandan-asylum-seeker-admits-to-setting-fire-to-french-cathedral-news.html

30/07/2020: David Dungay richly deserved to be executed, long before he died from his diabetes: ‘Dungay already had a lengthy criminal record, including robberies with violence and a weapon, before he was jailed for the attempted rape of his girlfriend, just 16. He’d tried to sodomise her, then beat her with a broomstick, chased her with a brick and punched her in the head. Dungay was also jailed over an armed robbery. He and three mates broke into a house, where they found a 61-year-old man, his sick wife and his 91-year-old mother in law. They bashed and stabbed the man so badly that he needed 27 stitches…’ Maybe you would like to invite folks like this into your home or become friends with them? https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt/andrew-bolt-black-lives-matter-protesters-ignore-truth-on-david-dungays-death/news-story/7778af710a21e96dbcf8be1d9a3348ca

29/07/2020: Frydenberg is perfectly right to champion Thatcher and Reagan’s economics. The crazy Keynesian spending we are seeing in the idiotic response to this virus is destroying the capitalist world’s economies (as China intended it would): https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/27/josh-and-switz-sitting-in-a-tree/

29/07/2020: If you believe in free speech find a few bucks to help Peter Ridd’s fight in the High Court, and write a letter to the government urging they do something to constrain JCU and the like institutions who think they can commit intellectual fraud with impunity: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/peter-ridd-will-take-it-to-the-high-court/

29/07/2020: BLM are completely unwilling to ‘own’ the enormous problem of black violence and crime. Yes, there is a reason why ‘aborigines’ are ‘over-represented’ in custody and other anti-social metrics: their behaviour is exponentially worse than the rest of the population’s (eg ‘the appalling rates of abuse that see Indigenous women 35 times more likely to be hospitalised due to family violence than other Australian women’). This is their problem, their fault. No-one else’s. The rest of Australia has funded them as a ‘special’ class for over 200 years and it has done no good at all. As a class ‘aborigines’ need to be abolished. ‘They’ must be simply subsumed as ‘people’ into the rest of the community with identical rights and duties. No special deals. No special government departments, funding, etc. Government and public response ought to be based only on need, not ‘race’. “The biggest hindrance to this reduction are distractions such as Coon cheese, treaties, preliminary voices, BLM lies, and accusations of racism for openly raising the topic.” says Jacinta Price: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/rita-panahi/rita-panahi-activists-strangely-silent-about-indigenous-violence-victims/news-story/4867251c828473a7862b97c814a937aa

28/07/2020: Some interesting examples of doing without the police (including Victoria’s 1923 police strike). PS. We don’t want this: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/15/doing-without-the-police/

28/07/2020: A Brief History of Slavery: https://www.spectator.com.au/2020/07/slaves-come-in-all-colours/

28/07/2020: Imagine contemplating cancelling Aristotle because of one view he expressed about slavery (even though he had been a slave himself!) Gone would be the entire underpinning of logic, philosophy, science and so much more: https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/why-are-we-even-contemplating-canceling-aristotle/

27/07/2020: Just take a look at this lightning: https://www.drroyspencer.com/2020/07/lightning-strike-video-close-up/ BTW Did you realize that the longest lightning bolt yet seen was over 700 miles?

27/07/2020: In the real world (think advanced countries like Senegal) you can get the results back from a (more reliable) Covid 19 saliva test while you wait (c 10 minutes). In Stalag Victoria the results come in after you are no longer infective (c one week) . Sack Dan!

27/07/2020: Watching the Three Gorges Dam Burst and Flood China. No it hasn’t happened yet: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjHWkCdZdOE&feature=emb_title

26/07/2020: Paleology is full of surprises: There is increasing evidence of a human presence in the America’s before the last Ice Age c 30,000BC: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/25/humans-inhabited-north-america-in-the-depths-of-the-last-ice-age-but-didnt-thrive-until-the-climate-warmed/

26/07/2020: Is this the world’s most fanciful ‘renewable energy’ project? https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/23/david-bidstrup-guest-post-singapore-sting/

26/07/2020: We already have the cure (Zelenko’s) I first referenced back in February (and Ivomectin, likewise). We can save millions of lives (and whole economies). All this is cheap and effective if implemented early as with any good medical practice/solution. Could we please stop playing games and just use common sense: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/07/letter-to-president-trump-from-us-doctor-behind-hydroxychloroquine-study-urges-widespread-adoption-o.html

25/07/2020: Get on with it and fine the pants of these people Andrews, you tosser: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/coronavirus-australia-conspiracy-theorist-slammed-over-dumb-stunt/news-story/cbed06cc67db8a8bff8e30b5c46970fc

25/07/2020:

25/07/2020: The hottest time in the Christian era were during the Roman Empire. Sea surface temperature (even) was 2C warmer – all this without C02. I am so over the greenie leftist alarmists and all their expensive statist ‘solutions’: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/hottest-summers-in-the-last-2000-years-were-during-roman-times/ here is the ice core data to prove the point: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/24/ancient-temperatures/

25/07/2020: The Anti Free Speech Movement is Just Horrifying. I simply have to oppose it with every fibre of my being. I know this will and does involve me in many nasty attacks, but so be it. The right and duty to say what you think is just too important to lose because of bullies. I will continue to call a spade a bloody shovel: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/23/the-media-is-now-opinion-checking/

24/07/2020: Unihertz Jelly 2: I have had their Atom phone which I am delighted with for a couple of years now. It is just great to have a phone in your fob pocket. This new one has a slightly bigger screen which will be appreciated, more ROM, is still dual SIM but now expandable with a microSD card. To me this is the ultimate phone! https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/jellyphone/jelly-2-worlds-smallest-android-10-4g-smartphone?ref=thanks-share&fbclid=IwAR0nS9JJXF6xhPBAIXZeVjAQNKugXUbtQIPUc0X7DCs_9SAlfbsiFsFHxYs

24/07/2020: The Lees/Falconio ‘Crime’ #3: Having watched the recent doco (‘Murder in the Outback’ and read several accounts of the ‘incident’ I am not convinced that NTPol established that a crime had been committed as Joanne Lees described. So far as I can see we have almost exclusively her unsupported word about its existence but contradicted by certain salient irrefutable facts. The veracity of her ‘word’ should also be measured against the fact that she did indeed lie under oath at the trial about details concerning her affair with Nick Ridley. What are the other contradictory facts?

First, there were no footprints other than Lees at the crime scene. No man’s and no dog’s. This was in dry soft country which takes a print well and was examined by four blacktrackers the next day who found none. Just taken alone, this is impossible.

Second is the blood. There was just not enough blood consistent with someone having been shot and left to bleed out on the tarmac whilst the assault apparently took place. I have to put sick sheep down from time to time, and of course I have shot many deer. The amount of blood produced is normally what you would expect if you kicked over a 4 litre red paint can. That is a pool half a square metre or so and half a centimeter deep!. The small amount of blood on the road is more consistent with a small cut or nose bleed – or with a deliberately self-inflicted wound intended to leave a small amount of blood for the purpose of establishing the ‘verisimilitude’ of a concocted story. The telling thing about the blood residue is that no firearms propellant residue is associated with it. In the case of a gunshot at close proximity this is just impossible. When a gun is fired distinctive chemical traces are propelled outwards at over 1,000 feet per second. There is no way to conceal this.

Third, the absence of the assailant’s DNA at the crime scene (and on the Kombi) is extraordinary. If someone assaulted and man-handled her as Lees described his DNA would have been all over her (everywhere he touched her, and on everything he handled) – not the single tiny speck which might easily have been acquired accidentally from some object such as a chair (eg at the Red Rooster café) which both had visited separately hours before.

Lastly her (shifting) descriptions of his vehicle, the dog and the offender. The vehicle initially had a space between the seats through which she was thrust into the back of the vehicle. This is very unusual, but I have seen it. Later she changed that description meaning that she was taken around to the back of the vehicle where she failed to see Falconio’s body. Really? The dog was definitely brown and white. Murdoch’s dog was black and white. Initially the offender was (much) younger with a different build, hair colour, facial hair and most compellingly well under 6’.

The truly striking thing about Murdoch (apart from his very distinctive build) which no-one could fail to notice (particularly if you were being assaulted by him) is that he is barely under 7’!

My guess is that she and Falconio ‘cooked up’ the whole story together (for the purposes of insurance fraud/publicity money – who knows? She has made around a million out of it, and who knows how much insurance money went to Falconio in some foreign country?

They also clearly had an accomplice/s to spirit Falconio away. Either the person Lees was seen talking to at a roadhouse earlier (which she denied – another lie) or the folk in the red car. There were three men altogether in the red car. If one assumes one was Falconio then the others were there to drive the red car and the ute which Falconio was later seen driving by two reliable witnesses in Bourke. So there are four people out there who know what happened, though Murdoch is not one of them. I would guess that the strange behaviour the truck driver noticed concerning the red car’s lights were that they were being used to light Falconio’s way back from planting the Kombi in the bush – also why only his and Lees’ DNA were on it. As soon as the truck driver arrived all jumped in the red car and sped off even though he spoke to them. Strange and suspicious behavior, and clearly somehow involved in the ‘incident’.

NTPol’s involvement in ‘creating’ the crime don’t put them above suspicion either. The fact that an unassisted police constable ‘visited’ the scene weeks later and managed to ‘find’ objects which had been ‘missed’ by the forensic team and four blacktrackers beggars belief. Once they had a match to the only (stranger) DNA present (the tiny speck on the back of her shirt) from Murdoch’s brother (whose DNA was on file, police set about to entrap him – and ‘colluded’ with a known criminal and liar to do so. They also clearly contaminated and mishandled key ‘evidence’ such as the manacles, and botched the photo ID process. The whole case hardly covers police in glory.

In any case Murdoch has already served more than a life sentence (now 16 years) for a crime which it seems to me never actually occurred. This is more than enough whatever happened. He should be released immediately.

24/07/2020: Apparently there are ‘millions’ of casualties in China’s floods. I don’t know how reliable this is, but it is obviously pretty awful – even more awful if it does not bring about the end of communist rule there: https://twitter.com/hashtag/ChinaFloods?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1285549098641260544%7Ctwgr%5E&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.michaelsmithnews.com%2F&src=hashtag_click

24/07/2020: Black Lives Matter must go ahead because…‘Chronic diabetic Dungay registered four consecutive dangerously high blood-sugar counts on the day of his death and had to be restrained from eating the biscuits lest they kill him. He wasn’t executed for hogging the Iced Vo-Vos. Forcibly sedated for his own good, Dungay died of cardiac arrhythmia during the commotion. A tragic event that could have been avoided had the 26 year-old not been convicted and imprisoned for assault occasioning actual bodily harm, aggravated attempted rape and robbery in company (home invasion). Deputy State Coroner, Derek Lee, refused to accept submissions recommending manslaughter charges against the five officers involved. Dungay’s death is being used to prosecute a war against Australian society.’ https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/23/anarchy/

23/07/2020: Andrews will force you to wear a mask when you are out and about by yourself nowhere near anyone else but he will not bring the full force of the law against those who knowingly infect others. The man is a bastard!

23/07/2020: Frozen in time – an interesting mystery solved: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/59146

23/07/2020: A horrible tragedy for free speech: I believe the government should act first against JCU then second to ensure what ought to be a common law right let along an academic right. Too many ‘rights’ in this post, but what the decision is cementing is the ‘right’ to a University enforcing falsehood – which is just what it has done. Truth certainly should win out in the end. The law ought never be used to suppress it.: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/ridd-appeal-jcu-spent-a-fortune-to-win-the-case-and-trash-its-own-reputation/

22/07/2020: Nantes: Christians Under Siege Throughout the World – the Moslem terror continues: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/19/christians-under-siege-throughout-the-world/

22/07/2020: The Terrible Things People Do to Each Other - All Lives matter: The Murders of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murders_of_Channon_Christian_and_Christopher_Newsom

22/07/2020: Has the Labor Party (at last) seen the light about ‘climate change’ ie that it is rubbish: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/20/another-labor-split-on-climate-and-energy/

21/07/2020: Forced Organ Harvesting in China is as just about bad as anything the Nazis did: https://quillette.com/2020/01/03/bloody-harvest-how-everyone-ignored-the-crime-of-the-century/

21/07/2020: Falconio: Too many holes in Lees’ story and the case against Murdoch. He has already served 16 years for a ‘crime’ which might never have occurred. It is long enough. He should be released. The key thing to me is that four blacktrackers could find no evidence that any other person (or dog) had been present at the crime scene (apart from Lees). I can assure you (after a lifetime of hunting – 65+ years), that if there had been a dog present I would have found its tracks – and so would an aboriginal tracker, who would be an even better hunter than I am. Therefore the only ‘evidence’ that a crime had occurred was Lees’ testimony – and she lied on oath during the trial about her affair with Nick Riley. Normally such perjury would be enough to dismiss all her uncorroborated testimony: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/crimeinfocus/peter-falconio-murder-questions-that-remain-a-mystery/news-story/394c54fd3a5de5ec4d8b0f0e442a4cd2

21/07/2020: Covid 19, the ‘Magic Bullet’ – Interferon is loking very good (80% efficacy) in this trial – maybe add it to your store of Ivermectin and Hydroxychloroquine, etc if you could get your hands on it: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/interferon-beta-reduced-risk-of-severe-covid-by-80/

21/07/2020: DIY Roll Up Hobo Stove or Windscreen: I made this last night out of some aluminium flashing. The aluminium will most likely not stand up to the intense heat of a fire for long, but as a prototype/proof of concept I am happy with it. Some .5mm (soft) stainless steel foil has arrived this morning in the mail so I will be able to try that soon instead.

I may even need a harder stainless steel or even titanium. It took me less than an hour to make on (a piece of plywood so as not to damage) the kitchen table after dinner.

I have made this (exactly) just wider than my 1100 ml pot so that as little heat as possible escapes and so that I can make a carbon fibre cosy to conserve heat when I am burning alcohol in it (such as with one of Tinny’s Gnomes). Preliminary results show a saving of at least a third in fuel usage! I have ordered some fire-resistant thread (aramid) to sew the cosy up with.

Because it is a cylinder it will press up against the inside of the pot (it fits completely inside) so that it takes up next to no space. It doubles as a wood stove and windscreen. This prototype weighs exactly 40 grams. I can see that the .5mm stainless steel one will weigh considerable less, probably less than an ounce (~30 grams)!

It would be easy to include a further piece of the same material in the pot to protect the ground and create a dry fire-lighting floor as the height of the is stove is greater than its diameter: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/07/20/diy-roll-up-hobo-stove-or-windscreen/

20/07/2020: Finnsheep: If you have read this blog regularly you will realise that I have been a farmer for many years. For the last few decades a sheep farmer. And more specifically Finnsheep, but not just any Finnsheep. These sheep are the result of forty years of very careful, very practical sheep breeding. I believe they are the best Finnsheep, and possibly the best sheep anywhere in the world: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/07/18/finnsheep/

Our aim has been to produce a sheep which will successfully raise 3-4 good lambs every lambing on pasture alone and in every kind of weather – and we have succeeded! At the same time we selected the sheep to produce 4 kilograms or more of soft long fine wool per shearing. This has never been done before. You can find out (much) more about our sheep on my main sheep page here: finnsheep.com

20/07/2020: Nearly 7%! It is a nasty virus. We should try to eliminate it if we can. Donald Trump is simply wrong about its ‘harmlessness’. The stats do not bear this out. They have remained much the same throughout (despite ‘better’ treatment). USA: deaths/cases (143233/3888153) = 3.68% or deaths/recovered 148233/1798932 = 7.96%; world: deaths/cases 608314/14618111) = 4.16% deaths/recovered (608314/8723723) = 6.97% - obviously some of the ‘’cases’ will go on to die, so the deaths/recovered stat says it all! Nearly 7%! https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ A sign of hope though: It has been around six months since large numbers of folk contracted it in China. Since then there have been very few (if any) reported cases of re-infection which indicates that ‘immunity’ lasts at least six months, ie twice per year vaccination would prevent nearly 100% of cases/ deaths! We can expect the cost of such vaccination to come down to less than $2 per person per year probably. Some of the vaccines look as if they might be rolled out before the end of this year as well. We may still be going to NZ (or Qld) next year! PS: Even amongst ‘young’ health care workers (taking all precautions, and with the best medical assistance) the death rate is 0.5%: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/death-rate-amongst-infected-us-healthcare-personnel-running-at-0-5/ The problem for us here in Oz is that we must eliminate it very quickly. We simply cannot afford to have the economy destroyed (any more).

20/07/2020: Wonnangatta Murders #15: An interesting item on the ABC - Russell's reported earlier 'altercation' a year earlier with the 'Button Man' is a revelation - as is the statement that he had also camped at the button man’s camp on the trip previous to their disappearance): https://mobile.abc.net.au/news/2020-07-19/how-four-people-disappeared-without-trace-in-victorian-mountains/12455124?nw=0&pfmredir=sm&fbclid=IwAR0xXWGgMKtgUixrO8VQoDgWnfiay7Hww35o-i12Dz_pk6gq-3KoAzmhLik

19/07/2020: We have the planes sitting idle. We have the airline staff. Now is the time to rid ourselves of the people who really don’t want to be Ausralians. How long would it really take?

19/07/2020: Maybe you wonder why the police sometimes have to shoot ‘suspects’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=52&v=aXpYqjKd8cE&feature=emb_title

19/07/2020: At least Princess Anne is sane – pity she wasn’t the oldest child: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/07/princess-anne-sticks-it-up-crazy-charles-over-his-climate-change-greenie-madness.html

18/07/2020: The climate modelers’ ultimate ‘get out of gaol free’ card’. Whatever happens (including global cooling) we can’t be wrong. Oh dear: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/climate-modelers-can-be-wrong-for-the-next-thirty-years-and-still-be-right/

18/07/2020: When you think of Xi remember this about Chairman Mao: He said ‘in 1957 upon the 50^th anniversary of the Russian Revolution that a nuclear war could be won by the Communist Bloc, even if it led to the deaths of half the population of the world: ‘Half dies, half lives — but imperialism would be razed to the ground and the whole world would become socialist’’. This is Macbeth on steroids! As with the appalling death cult, Islam communism has always and ever will be about death, not life. The more dead the more ‘purity’ has been produced! The only question is whether Xi’s regime implodes before it visits some alarming calamity on the world. At the moment he does not seem particularly troubled that his policies are actually hurting China and the Chinese people (who have long been inured to suffering). The people of Hong Kong have been showing that their ‘patience’ with suffering is very nearly at an end however. The West really should make a strenuous effort to bribe the Red Army to defect, to step aside and allow regime change to take place (perhaps it already has). Seventy years of tyranny is more than enough! PS: I imagine Xi to be just the right age to have been a leading member of the ‘Red Guards’ who butchered so many millions in the 1960s. Interestingly the first ‘Mao’ was the leader of the Taiping rebellion which murdered 20-30 million people. The second ‘Mao’ held the first to be an exemplar! For himself. And went on to murder over 100 million! Such monsters! https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/china/2020/07/xi-jinpings-gambit-not-so-inscrutable/

18/07/2020: Black Lives matter? Kids in alleged rape of boy, 5, on Cape York (from today’s ‘Australian’) ‘A five-year-old boy was allegedly gang-raped on a beach by other children from a remote Indigenous community on Cape York this month…A study, headed by then Griffith University professor Stephen Smallbone, into sexual abuse in several Indigenous communities in north Queensland was so shocking it was kept secret for more than three years.The Smallbone report, released in 2016, found that sexual offences in Aurukun — just south of Napranum and with many familial and traditional links — were reported at a rate 6.6 times higher than the norm in the state between 2001 and 2012. The mean age of victims was 14…The study also reported that the incidence of sexually transmitted disease — mainly syphilis — was a staggering 56 times the state average, including the infection of 29 children younger than 10. Police could decide against formal charges and go instead for the restorative justice process if they assessed it would be difficult to prove an offence, for instance due to the age of those involved. The Queensland government says online that restorative justice “is an internationally recognised evidence-based response to criminal behaviour...“We are using restorative justice processes to reduce an overrepresentation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in the justice system.” Wow!

17/07/2020: Those early men were amazingly clever, as this delicate hand axe illustrates. The fact that they managed to cross the Wallace Line (in Indonesia) nearly a million years ago shows that they could build sea-going ships back then, which certainly implies many complex intellectual achievements including language (for complex co-operation) and no doubt story-telling and history. I think it is only a matter of time before their remains are also found in Australia. Fossilisation is a very haphazard process. What then becomes of absurd claims by current groups to be the ‘original’ inhabitants (and therefore requiring ‘special’ treatment or status? Well, their destruction of the previous pygmy inhabitants I wrote about yesterday proves that they were not. http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/59092 & https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/history-wars/2002/06/the-extinction-of-the-australian-pygmies/

17/07/2020: This is the only way forward if you want a ‘carbon-free’ future: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/15/new-ontario-power-record-895-days-reliable-uninterrupted-24x7-zero-carbon-power/

17/07/2020: According to the Smithsonian (no less) this is what’s wrong about ‘being white’! I can’t find a single thing wrong myself. This is the poster-child par excellence of the inmates being in charge of the asylum:

16/07/2020: New population forecasts are more hopeful than those when I was growing up which saw population rise as inexorable and the world’s population out-massing the earth in the next few centuries. Clearly that couldn’t happen. None of the demographers foresaw the effect of capitalism and democracy as suppressors of population growth though. The stabilization and gradual decline of the population will be good news for wilderness and wildlife which are already benefiting from this phenomenon in the richer countries such as Europe, Japan, North America, Australia etc where huge tracks of once agricultural land have been returned to nature. ‘Rewilding’ has its problems though and needs to be more carefully managed. For example in Portugal they have found that the Iberian lynx (a very rare critter indeed) actually did better in conjunction with peasant farmers and worse in rewilded areas: https://www.news.com.au/technology/environment/global-population-to-peak-at-2064-before-heading-into-inexorable-decline/news-story/351620157a9cca2cf15922dcf294db6a

16/07/2020: Absolutely. Stan Grant is not a ‘race victim’. In fact I am old enough to remember when he was a ‘white man’ and had white skin too, not the colour he has ‘painted’ on now. You can look back though some old photos of him to see what I mean. Why it was only a handful of years ago that SBS started up this weird ‘black face’ make-up game. Plenty of other ‘aboriginal’ (and other) people before Stan were outstanding successes in life (because of their own internal qualities and good fortune) and plenty more will be again. This victim/blaming ‘game’ is just wrong and indeed racist twaddle: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt/andrew-bolt-why-stan-grant-must-stop-playing-the-victim-card/news-story/d88691890052db6b27cef85c7854e21f

16/07/2020: A narrow (but crucial) victory for civilisation in Poland: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/15/duda-wins-but-swords-are-still-drawn-for-civilisation/

15/07/2020: Doubts about ‘aboriginal history’: Present day ‘aborigines’ were clearly not the ‘first Australians’. Note for example a line of deer in the ‘Bradhsaw Paintings’ or a prehistoric ship with a rudder, or the (recent C20th) existence of a ‘race’ of pygmies on Cape York. Confecting history to support political grievance and alter public policy is dangerous stuff: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/history-wars/2002/06/the-extinction-of-the-australian-pygmies/ & http://www.convictcreations.com/aborigines/bradshaws.htm & http://www.bradshawfoundation.com/bradshaws/introduction.php & http://www.convictcreations.com/aborigines/floranadfauna.html & https://cairnsnews.org/2018/10/26/republish-dreamtime-a-cruel-delusion-of-british-anthropologists/?wref=tp&wref=tp

15/07/2020: Nic Cater makes several good points. I said several times way back in Jan-Feb that we could not afford to spend $100,000 each (or any similar sum of money) saving my life or similar lives. At the time we already had proven safe treatments such as Ivermectin and Hydroxylchloroquine etc which would have saved 90%+ of the lives we have lost since then (but the medical Left who have been in charge - think the commies in WHO) have (still) refused to use them; all this without any economic destruction, let alone the shredding of our liberties! https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/coronavirus-we-are-locking-down-the-economy-and-our-future/news-story/ffa5e56159233413f48f1b560767c55d?fbclid=IwAR0Z-7-qZnNbViBoaAjLAF04R7C4zaeTOZ8zVz-2KhqjJd2bZlftX1q5Ojo

15/07/2020: So it was Whitlam (the Republican) and not Kerr who cried ‘Save me Mommy’! Such a bombastic and incompetent man. No wonder he lost the 1975 election in such a landslide -and the economy did not fully recover until around 1983 from the destruction he and his team of fools had wrought. https://www.heraldsun.com.au/blogs/andrew-bolt/kerr-letters-expose-gough-whitlam-as-the-republican-sellout/news-story/ba51bac106bb0c51e41a898a219b973e

14/07/2020: Quote of the day: Nothing is so permanent as a temporary government program. — Milton Friedman

14/07/2020: How Cholesterol Experts Were Wrong about fat: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/for-80-years-cholesterol-experts-said-eat-less-fat-but-they-never-had-any-evidence/

14/07/2020: Covid 19: Bring on the sheep drench: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/more-cheap-potential-covid-treatments-ivermectin-saves-50/

13/07/2020: Quote of the week: ‘A Government Department is the nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on earth.’ - Ronald Reagan

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13/07/2020: David Leyonhjelm on the role of the police force - always interesting reading: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/11/david-leyonhjelm-guest-post-the-problem-with-the-police/#more-124614 Sir Robert Peel's nine principles of policing were as follows:

To prevent crime and disorder, as an alternative to their repression by military force and severity of legal punishment.
To recognise always that the power of the police to fulfill their functions and duties is dependent on public approval of their existence, actions and behaviour, and on their ability to secure and maintain public respect.
To recognise always that to secure and maintain the respect and approval of the public means also the securing of the willing co-operation of the public in the task of securing observance of laws.
To recognise always that the extent to which the co-operation of the public can be secured diminishes proportionately the necessity of the use of physical force and compulsion for achieving police objectives.
To seek and preserve public favour, not by pandering to public opinion, but by constantly demonstrating absolutely impartial service to law, in complete independence of policy, and without regard to the justice or injustice of the substance of individual laws, by ready offering of individual service and friendship to all members of the public without regard to their wealth or social standing, by ready exercise of courtesy and friendly good humour, and by ready offering of individual sacrifice in protecting and preserving life.
To use physical force only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient to obtain public co-operation to an extent necessary to secure observance of law or to restore order, and to use only the minimum degree of physical force which is necessary on any particular occasion for achieving a police objective.
To maintain at all times a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and that the public are the police, the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.
To recognise always the need for strict adherence to police-executive functions, and to refrain from even seeming to usurp the powers of the judiciary of avenging individuals or the State, and of authoritatively judging guilt and punishing the guilty.
To recognise always that the test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder, and not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with them.

12/07/2020: Falconio Again: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/crimeinfocus/peter-falconio-murder-joanne-lees-stepdad-says-bradley-john-murodch-is-innocent/news-story/126d6d963e3a206f9956e6549689b82e New 2020 Channel Four four part doco ‘Murder in the Ourback: The Falconio and Lees Mystery’ about this available here and there, eg Pirate Bay. Murdoch was convicted on the basis of a single tiny piece of his DNA he almost certainly left at an Alice Springs Red Rooster Lees visited shortly after he left it and on the basis of a very blurry photo of someone at least 4’ shorter than him at a roadside servo. If he had assaulted her as she claimed his DNA would have been all over her and it just wasn’t. Otherwise there are just so many weird things about this ‘murder’ including highly reliable sightings of Falconio days after his supposed death. Lees was clearly lying to police (and it is also clear they thought so too). She also lied under oath while giving testimony at Murdoch’s trial (There is proof of this). Her version of the ‘events’ beside the Stuart Highway are not believable. For example, she claimed that her assailant and his dog searched for her ‘for hours’ adjacent to the highway, yet four experienced police black-trackers were unable to find any tracks at all apart from her own. She also changed her story a number of times and especially her description of her assailant and his vehicle – statements given under oath. You should obtain copies of this series and watch it. Very compelling viewing. I have no doubt that Murdoch is not a pleasant character. If the roles were reversed and an ugly person such as him had been ‘murdered’ by an attractive woman such as her she would never have been convicted. The NT Police have got this one wrong just as they did the Chamberlain case, and as it turns out on exactly the same dodgy DNA processes. He has already served 16 years for a crime he should not have been convicted of, and should be released. It is certain his ‘guilt’ was not proved ‘beyond reasonable doubt’. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Murder_of_Peter_Falconio

12/07/2020: Should the ‘Black Hills’ be renamed? Anyway who stole them? Imagine being given a billion dollars ‘compensation’ for something you stole! https://rosebyanyothernameblog.wordpress.com/2020/07/08/will-whoever-stole-the-black-hills-please-return-them/

12/07/2020: ‘Someone’ blew up Iran’s nuclear enrichment facility. Completely destroyed. Good work Bibi: https://hotair.com/archives/john-s-2/2020/07/09/satellite-photos-show-irans-main-centrifuge-assembly-hall-destroyed/

11/07/2020:

11/07/2020: Dan the Man – no need for an inquiry; this is how it shambled: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/08/even-if-you-already-understood-daniel-andrews-is-an-incompetent-fool-wait-till-you-read-this/ & https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/how-a-catalogue-of-failures-turned-victoria-into-a-virus-timebomb/news-story/da01b73b37ce3c88eb18c3f8c73bb15d

11/07/2020: Our BOM as ‘cancel culture’ heroes make strenuous efforts to delete Australia’s clearly hottest day ever officially recorded way back in 1909. Why? You guess: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/hottest-day-recorded-and-deleted-in-australia-was-51-7-in-bourke-in-1909/ We can see the same sort of thing elsewhere eg in the US with this 1913 high temperature record: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/10/death-valley-high-temperature-record-of-july-10-1913/

11/07/2020: Meanwhile: Temperature Hits 100 Degrees Above Arctic Circle, Just Like 100 Years Ago: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/23/climate-change-temperature-hits-100-degrees-above-arctic-circle-just-like-100-years-ago/ But two weeks later it is snowing in summer in the very same place: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/07/remember-when-we- were-told-the-arctic-is-on-fire-and-we-should-all-be-terrified-its-snowing-there-now/

10/07/2020: In Praise of Empires – what an important an insightful essay: https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2020/07-08/in-praise-of-empires/

10/07/2020: Conrad Black is right; the media (class) is determinedly counter-culture, anti-capitalist – frankly wicked and unhinged. The only hope is that Trump (despite his flaws) wins a a second term. Else, I feel the western world is doomed: https://www.nysun.com/national/press-now-plumbs-its-own-depths-of-depravity/91183/

10/07/2020: If we have to have this pandemic it is good that it is becoming less deadly. In the US the death rate has plunged 90% in two months: https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/07/not_dying_is_bad_for_headlines_.html

https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/07/compare-and-contrast-us-daily-new-covid-cases-with-daily-deaths.html This is why: https://reason.com/2020/07/06/as-covid-19-cases-surge-daily-deaths-and-the-case-fatality-rate-continue-to-fall/ and another one: Restrictions on Hydroxychloroquine Contribute to the COVID-19 Cases Surge: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/05/hypothesis-restrictions-on-hydroxychloroquine-contribute-to-the-covid-19-cases-surge/

09/07/2020:

09/07/2020: Meanwhile, A Beautiful flight over an icy crater on Mars: https://www.sciencealert.com/new-mars-footage-let-s-you-take-a-flight-over-the-korolev-crater-on-mars/amp?fbclid=IwAR23Qtl8YwjV2w3jc5T7x5uzymrfSmCMTd2r84ndLEQIk-8lgqH1ytGZxW0

09/07/2020: The Three Gorges Dam is now at serious risk. Poor Wuhan (20% already under water). Regime change anyone? http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/watching-the-three-gorges-dam/

09/07/2020: The Tyranny of Cancel Culture: ‘The reaction to Trump’s Mount Rushmore speech has provided a fascinating insight into contemporary wokeness, into the outlook of those convinced that they are in possession of all the correct thoughts and that they must now cleanse and reorder the minds of those who are not… This is cancel culture’s most grotesque achievement: to chill everyday discussion; to make examples of prominent wrongthinkers in order to warn the entire population; to enforce and police parameters of acceptable thought and to make it clear that anyone who steps outside of them risks, in Trump’s words, being ‘censored, banished, blacklisted, persecuted and punished’. It is real, it is wrong, and it is destructive. It harms individuals and it shatters liberty. It induces fear in ordinary people and it stultifies public debate. A healthy society is built on freedom, openness and the rights of dissent and intellectual experimentation. Cancel culture undermines all of those things. That’s why it must be defeated.’ https://www.spiked-online.com/2020/07/06/the-tyranny-of-cancel-culture/ This from Iowahawk: David Burge: ‘Noam Chomsky was a Cambodian Genocide denier who defended Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge, and today I learned cancel culture has gotten too wacky even for him.’

08/07/2020: An American President’s Greatest Speech – no, not the Gettysburg Address: https://amgreatness.com/2020/07/04/a-magnificent-speech/

08/07/2020:

08/07/2020: This is all the fault of incompetent commie clown Andrews. Needless to say I said you should never vote for him/them. Still though all the people who did the right thing are in lock-down those faux ‘Australians’ who were paid to return by us (when they were told to return in March), and all those who refused to be tested and all the commies who broke restrictions so they could have racist protests are to blame – and Andrews abetted all of them. He still refuses to compulsorily test just as he will fail to keep the same type of people locked down, so the virus will be impossible to control. Victoria may as well give up on it right now and just let the people who are going to die of it do so. No doubt it is still difficult to access the cure as well. Great. (ie Hydroxychloroquine 200 mg twice a day + Azithromycin 500 mg + Zinc sulfate 220 mg once a day for 5 days – suggest you stock up. Clive Palmer ensured there is an adequate supply)

07/07/2020: Why ‘culture’ is important: https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2020/07/a-viral-new-bird-song-in-canada-is-causing-sparrows-to-change-their-tune/

07/07/2020: Beavers cause global warming – might be time for a new hat then: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/01/climate-scientist-anyone-who-wants-to-predict-the-future-of-the-permafrost-should-be-sure-to-keep-the-beaver-in-mind/

07/07/2020: Quote of the week: ‘The problem isn’t that Johnny can’t read. The problem isn’t even that Johnny can’t think. The problem is that Johnny doesn’t know what thinking is; he confuses it with feeling.’ ― Thomas Sowell

07/07/2020: The Terror that is China: If you read nothing else this week/year you must read this essay. I rarely have anything good to say about the Left, but Clive Hamilton’s warnings about China are a crucial exception: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/china/2020/07/clive-hamiltons-brave-and-urgent-alarm/

06/07/2020: What does one do when the virtue-signalling market is flooded? https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/world/2020/07/boris-johnson-s-fianc-e-carrie-symonds-calls-for-end-to-monkey-slavery.html

06/07/2020: Another climate catastrophist (along with Michael Moore) has recanted. Now Michael Schellenberger says it was all a mistake. Sorry for all the alarm and the countless billions of dollars wasted – not to mention the millions of lives and billions of animals destroyed (eg by their clearing tropical forests to grow biodiesel) & etc. (And hypocritical Kevin Rudd spends $17 million on a beach house!) These people: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/29/schellenberger-on-behalf-of-environmentalists-i-apologize-for-the-climate-scare/

06/07/2020: This is what the United Nations thinks of human rights. Just take a look at the countries voting for the crushing of Hing Kong. The UN is a joke (at best) and needs to be reformed/abolished – almost certainly the latter. There is already too much government: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/06/what-do-you-call-a-vote-of-despots-and-tyrants/

05/07/2020: Racist Fish:

05/07/2020: Don’t believe in the police force but require private security? The City of Minneapolis is spending $4,500 a day for private security for three council members…(They) have been outspoken proponents of defunding the Minneapolis Police Department. https://www.fox9.com/news/minneapolis-council-members-get-private-security-after-threats You couldn’t invent this stuff!

5/07/2020: Lessons from Mengele: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2020/06/22/revisiting-mengeles-malignant-race-science

5/07/2020: Hydroxychloroquine: Improving Survival in Hospitalised patients by 50%: https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/02/health/hydroxychloroquine-coronavirus-detroit-study/index.html Taken earlier in this combination will produce even better results: This is the prescription which has saved millions of lives:

1. Hydroxychloroquine 200 mg twice a day for 5 days

2. Azithromycin 500 mg once a day for 5 days

3. Zinc sulfate 220 mg once a day for 5 days

4/07/2020: Will the Three Gorges dam Burst? This is what ‘losing the mandate of heaven’ looks like in China. If so, Xi is (probably) doomed. We can only hope so and that with him communism completely collapses there too: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/china-floods-mud-hail-raise-concerns-about-the-three-gorges-dam/

4/07/2020: The Tiniest of Knives: Just as a follow-up to my recent utility knife post I have recently become aware of these two wonderful little knives, one of which must just about qualify as being the tiniest of knives at .169 oz (4.8 grams) – less than a credit card, they say in their ad! The other is a cheaper, slightly heavier version of the Dragonfly knife: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/07/03/the-tiniest-of-knives/

4/07/2020: The Coming Great Koala Plague: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/koalas-extinct-no-chance-its-just-another-man-made-boom-n-bust-cycle/

4/07/2020: Cosmic Mysteries – Disappearing Stars: https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2020/06/a-massive-star-has-disappeared-without-a-trace/

4/07/2020: Independence Day: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.’

3/07/2020: Ten people who ought to be permanently out of work – on bread and water, (instead of being allowed to waste $10 million dollars): https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/07/02/our-new-national-brand-plagiarism/

3/07/2020: Our Defence surge is necessary, but it has been too long coming. This vital area has been botched for too long. Howard made some improvements but they needed to be built on, not squandered (as Gillard did). Then we had Malcolm with his ridiculous submarine contract to be delivered long after 2032, 2 operational subs, <50 tanks, etc, etc. Meanwhile the communist dictatorship in China becomes increasingly dangerous. Well, it always was – why did the West ever back it? Long past time to give India a leg up folks. I suspect much of Xi and his oligopoly’s saber rattling underlines internal weaknesses but they can always (dangerously) be deflected into an external war. Whether many of China’s only children will actually die for their country as compared with those from vast families within Islam for example is an interesting intellectual exercise which I am loath to test. If I were the G7 I would buy the Red Army. Yes, you heard that right. I would buy their loyalty right out from under Pres Xi. If you offer them individual safety and prosperity outside the protection of their communist state they may well then stand back and allow the people to bloodlessly sweep Xi and his clique aside. There are hundreds of millions of Chinese people just longing for freedom, capitalism and a liberal democracy. I believe this time is now. https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt-scott-morrisons-scramble-to-buy-war-weapons-is-too-little-too-late/news-story/34a27b69a9c326fb55e98c8f283d1c68

03/07/2020: Pentridge and Old Melbourne Gaol are I believe still available to ‘house’ those who (in all conscience no doubt) refuse Covid testing. Of course 14 days quarantine is necessary for such people as they must be presumed to be infectious to protect the population. I suspect just that the offer of fourteen days in the ‘Bluestone College’ would be enough to convince all but a very tiny percentage that testing was in their and the public’s interest. Dan, you are a bloody fool. Smarten up or move over. These irresponsible diseased animals are putting the public at risk every day and look like destroying all that we have proudly achieved at enormous cost so far. PS: There are now 10,000 ‘refuseniks’ in the ‘hot spots’ (Why am I not surprised?) These people are not Australians. These people deserve no protection from Australian law, welfare or Government services. In two days this number has gone from 1,000 to 10,000 - spreading faster than the virus! https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/rita-panahi/rita-panahi-how-our-human-rights-charter-rules-out-mandatory-virus-tests/news-story/37703fa8a6cc2b7f87d7341e49e1442e & https://www.heraldsun.com.au/coronavirus/new-reports-of-risky-behaviour-by-staff-linked-to-hotel-quarantine-outbreaks/news-story/d5d5d180001de6764b2e35180cce3294 & https://www.heraldsun.com.au/coronavirus/hospitals-gear-up-as-fears-grow-over-dangerous-virus-surge/news-story/4a6c926618927968e9f994b21e4613f5

02/07/2020: The Carry-on Knife Problem Solved: It is such a nuisance arriving at your destination and not having your favourite knife available for those simple tasks like peeling an apple, opening a box, cutting a rope etc. It is also awkward to have to post your knife ahead for pick-up or buy one then throw it away or post it back - but there is a better way, as they say: the folding utility knife: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/07/02/the-carry-on-knife-problem-solved/

02/07/2020: Mauritania: Where 10% of the population still live in slavery. Black lives matter? http://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2012/03/world/mauritania.slaverys.last.stronghold/index.html

02/07/2020: Michael Flynn hits back. We are at war with socialism. The very future of civilization is at stake: https://www.westernjournal.com/exclusive-gen-flynn-dont-act-2-people-control-98/

02/07/2020: And in case you thought Covid 19 was not bad enough China now has another one. We must end communism in China. Re-elect Trump: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/07/01/viral-encore-another-swine-flu-strain-in-china-reportedly-threatens-to-become-a-pandemic/

01/07/2020: One of the world’s greatest economists and intellectuals Thomas Sowell turns 90: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/30/thomas-sowell-turns-ninety/

01/07/2020: Well said Anthony Dillon: ‘Walk a mile in our shoes before you criticise.’ Maybe they should try walking a few yards in the shoes of the police just to see what it’s like…If they really want to help make things better…footage of black-on-black violence, of child abuse and community dysfunction would be a catalyst for conversations about the need to address real problems rather than largely notional ones’. https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/bennelong-papers/2020/06/when-the-facts-fade-to-black/ PS: Anthony Dillon identifies as a part-Aboriginal Australian who is proud of both his Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal ancestries. PPS: In all this there is probably nothing less helpful than the ‘Stolen Generations’ Myth. In fact there was no stolen generation. People have been unable to name even 10 out of a supposed 100,000 and none had succeeded in proving the truth of their claim before the law. Meanwhile aboriginal women - and children especially continue to suffer terribly: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/blogs/andrew-bolt/what-jessie-stephens-never-heard-about-the-stolen-generations/news-story/fcb4e97d695339d2e2c3beb39165f2c5

01/07/2020: Masks and Vitamin D – nearly as good as a vaccine (Effectiveness: 75% + 40%). Use them: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/07/cheap-ways-to-starve-a-virus-masks-reduce-spread-by-70-distance-by-80/

01/07/2020: Keep Skippy.This is nuts: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/rendezview/miranda-devine-nation-brand-are-wrong-to-propose-replacing-the-kangaroo-with-wattle-as-australias-national-symbol/news-story/fbaaf97893136b57b094af1d9f11eb34

30/06/2020: So, 1,000 people in Melbourne today refused to be tested for Covid 19. They don't want to be part of Australia. I have a solution for them: immediate and permanent 'outlawry'. They did not want to be part of Australia? They no longer are. The may receive nothing from the Government including no protection from its laws. They are now on their own. Anyone may do anything to them with impunity. However, they can have 24 hours to leave permanently before this takes effect.

30/06/2020: What it’s like to live in a city full of moose: https://weather.com/safety/news/2020-06-12-living-in-a-city-full-of-moose

30/06/2020: Why can’t people see and learn from their mistakes? Koestler called it the ‘ghost in the machine’ – humans have a fatal (intellectual) flaw. Is there a cure? I don’t know: https://www.aier.org/article/why-facts-dont-matter-to-people/ For example: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/29/a-tale-of-two-or-three-energy-policies/

30/06/2020: Sweden has certainly conducted a very interesting ‘experiment’: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/28/the-progress-of-the-covid-19-epidemic-in-sweden-an-analysis/

29/06/2020: These people putting everyone’s lives at risk need to be publicly whipped. Let’s get seious people. These people are also risking the billions we have already spent on this. Such selfishness should be rewarded with something they will understand at once. Say fifty strokes of the lash! Yes, I am utterly serious: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/coronavirus/new-saliva-test-fasttracked-to-coronavirus-hotspot-suburbs/news-story/f7e706de36bbf5c7b47cec1b5de77e7e

29/06/2020: The Greens are just thoroughly evil. ‘For cobalt alone, over 40,000 Congolese children, as young as four years old, slave away alongside their parents in mines, for a dollar a day, risking cave-ins and being exposed constantly to filthy, toxic, radioactive mud, dust, water and air. That’s today – for today’s battery, solar panel and wind turbine needs. Imagine how many would be needed to serve the Green New Deal. 400,000 perhaps? 4,000,000?’ The Greens must be destroyed. https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/22/greens-promote-child-slave-labor-and-ecological-destruction/

29/06/2020: Terriblisation: I think this is the chiefest cause of human misery. Some folks just can’t help but cry, ‘Woe is me’ at the drop of every merest hat! There is no sense to this constant litany that all is terrible. An immense logical fallacy is involved: the external world is wholly indifferent to us (and everyone else). It is neither good nor bad, and entirely uncaring. Nor should it be. It is inanimate. It is not peopled by malevolent spirits or any other sort of boojums. It is the little man riding in your head who is responsible for this mis-identification, not some big man in the sky. It is he (or she) who discerns all as being terrible. It is your response, to what is more like than not no calamity at all. Sometimes it is, though. A young friend of mine posted recently on the ‘secret’ of his happiness. Judged by what the external world has ‘done’ to him, you might think he has no ‘right’ to be happy. The love of his life was wrenched terribly from him in her early twenties. He chooses instead to be happy – as she would have wanted! She loved him, you see! Because of her, he has a duty to be happy. And so he is. I could mention many other people known to me whose circumstances have been anything but fortunate but who rise above them. To end the terribilisation, you have to make a choice, to slough off that despond, to pass it by, to not be rapt in it. Let it pass. Move on. So many joys await…

29/06/2020: Did you realize that there are people who believe that if there is a type of work you don’t want to do you shouldn’t have to do it, but that someone else who does want to do it should do it instead and then pay taxes to you so you have the choice to refuse, and do nothing. The mystery is, ‘Who are these people who want to do that work and pay the taxes so you have the right to refuse?’ Strangely I have never met a single one of them. I suspect they may be mythical beasts like the Yeti, dragons, gnomes…

28/06/2020: The sense of entitlement is just mind-boggling: 30% of those ‘returned’ so-called Australians flown back and quarantined in 5-star hotels at our expense refuse to be tested for Covid 19! Many/most continue to fraternise with others in ‘quarantine’ or break it in other ways, spread it throughout the community and still speak of ‘rights’ – as if they should not be shot down in the street like mad dogs if they want to spread contagion like diseased animals! I am so sick of the ‘welfare mentality’. How is it I get to be a slave to these people as if I wanted to build their pyramids and such? Why would I take money out of my pocket and hand it to them voluntarily when they do nothing for me to earn it? It only happens because I am compelled to do so. The most important right is the right to private property. These spongers steal my property at every turn with impunity. Oh, what a vile tyranny socialism is! But it will end – in their bitter tears, mark my words! & https://www.heraldsun.com.au/rendezview/peta-credlin-victorias-covid19-case-number-spike-risks-australias-economic-recovery/news-story/86b84993d3e00d442a01f118b17aa75e PS: If I refuse to be tested please can I have a holiday for fourteen days (now 24 days) in a Five Star Hotel at no cost to myself? Is it any wonder there are takers? I/we have never in our lives afforded to stay in such a hotel! Fortunately I have never wanted to either; I do prefer to sleep out on the ground in the wilderness!

28/06/2020: All around our district businesses have signs out the front saying ‘Workers wanted’. I have not seen anything like it since the Sixties. For example the local wrecker where I bought ‘new’ doors for the Disco I bent a little bt a while back has had this sign up for nearly a month. He says no-one will apply because they are being paid double (by us all) not to work! ‘Jobseeker’ and ‘Jobkeeper’ are just insane plans. This is not the way to get Australia back to work. PS: Also the names of the schemes should be changed to something which has the word ‘work’ in them. The scientific and literal definition of ‘work’ is the effort of moving mass over distance. It is not the ‘position’. It is the ‘doing’. ‘Job’ conveys a sense of entitlement. ‘Work’’ conveys a sense of something actually done for your earned money. You ‘earn’ if you ‘work’. Not otherwise! Let’s start that now. After all, it’s our money which pays for this nonsense! PS: Just to use the local wreckers as an example: It may not be the Rolls Royce of jobs, but I have done much worse work myself for many years (and paid taxes out of my wages). I resent supporting folk who won't support themselves.This has been going on in my life since the early 1960s. I have seen countless examples of it. I have also had paid work for people lots of times, offered it to people, been refused, reported them to Centrelink - and nothing done! I'm sorry I just don't believe in 'welfare', ie something for nothing.

28/06/2020: Chess is racist because white always moves first, but it would be just as racist if black always moved first. Oh dear. PS: Tooth paste is racist too – and bread, milk, clouds, ice, elephants...No, not all elephants.

27/06/2020: Those BLM folk do realize don’t they that Islam still has black slaves whom they continue to abuse, chain, rape, castrate whilst these activists look on uncaringly as Moslems are the ‘downtrodden’, don’t you know? https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/06/black-slaves-matter/

27/06/2020: Western Civilisation – where did it go? ‘All it took was one generation of neglect, just one, and poof, the reserve of bourgeois values necessary to maintain Western Civilization all disappeared. And I'm not sure it's possible to ever get it back. Because, as G.K. Chesterton once said, “if men will not be governed by the Ten Commandments, they shall be governed by the ten thousand commandments.”: http://ace.mu.nu/archives/388860.php

27/06/2020: Wonnangatta #14: A few more clues in today’s Herald Sun ‘interview’ with a close friend of Russell Hill: Mr Ashlin says, ‘Russell would never, ever leave his vehicle’. (So they really did not go for a walk and get lost. We can definitely discount that). He also says that during their final conversation (of Russell) ‘He was sparkling like normal, he never had a worry in the world. The way he was behaving was like he had done any other time up in the bush. He was upbeat during our last chat’.) So there was no indication (to his friend) that there was anything about what happened to Russell that he had any apprehension about). “During their final conversation Mr Hill announced he was at Wonnangatta station and soon planned to drive to Dargo, about 70km away. He had not been there before and asked for directions’. (This is a surprise to me). ‘Something that puzzles Mr Ashlin about the mystery is why Mr Hill went camping alone in the area of the King Billy and Bluff Track between March 11 and 13 before the pair’s trip. “He never said boo about it, it was a surprise,” he said… “I don’t know why he went on that trip, it was only an overnight stay, and a six-hour drive each way. There is something strange about it. Robyn can’t work it out either.”’ – Perhaps he met his murderer/s on that occasion? Did he have (unknown) business with him/them?

There is also this photo of Russell camping (on a sunny day):

Missing man Russell Hill on an earlier camping trip.

You will remember that Russell’s hat was on the dash of his car and that the car was locked and the keys missing. Russell clearly took precautions against sun exposure. This pretty clearly shows that what happened to them happened on the night of the 19th March as he would clearly have taken his hat if he went for a walk on the 20th.

Mr Ashlin also said: ‘He’s been attacked, I believe there is more than one person involved.’ He does not explain why he thinks this. Perhaps it means nothing – but it is quite difficult for one person to lift (two) bodies into a 4WD (even moreso if it was a tray/ute) by themselves. (Two people are also more likely to be caught than one acting alone). The more people who know the more likely the truth will leak out. https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/friends-last-conversation-with-missing-high-country-camper-russell-hill-revealed/news-story/3ab69d511adaa85926918fa8f92ab088

26/06/2020: Up to now this was the greatest US President ever, perhaps always will be. Watch this: one of his greatest speeches (back in 1964): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdP7gspt8CE

26/06/2020: Mind you if this is what Trump has to beat he won’t have a very hard time doing it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y0VTlipoNWQ

26/06/2020: Interestingly penguins would benefit from Antarctica melting (not that something twice as big as Australia that is at a temperature of -50C is ever likely to): http://joannenova.com.au/2020/06/penguins-pretty-happy-about-melting-sea-ice/

26/06/2020: The two greatest evils of the last millennium remain communism and Islam – and they are still both with us, and still doing us harm. Maybe not so much as the hundreds of millions each have murdered (more for Islam) but the recent Covid 19 outbreak in Vic illustrates both. Both these vile creeds had a hand in it: both groups broke the health protocols and social distancing rules we all had to obey to protect everyone – because they are (both) just ‘better’ than us and don’t give a damn! The BLM are communists – I supposed you knew that. Of course what I am saying here is now ‘hate speech’ because it has become illegal to call out evil for just what it is. But seriously how can any creed (both) which murders millions (annually on average!) ever be confused with something good? If I am to be prosecuted for pointing out that murder is evil we have descended into the pit a really long way – and I suspect we have! PS: If you can’t read this it’s time you paid for a subscription to the Herald Sun: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt/why-we-need-to-probe-if-tribalism-is-behind-new-coronavirus-spike/news-story/d1611a9e5f7b5191dcbedcb81c104ac3 & https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/06/muslim-end-of-ramadan-celebration-responsible-for-large-cluster-of-victorias-coronavirus-cases.html PPS: Yes, there are others too in Australia who refuse to join the ‘team’, (some recent arrivals, some a result of generations of ‘pay to breed’ experiments) who refuse to see that we are all in this boat together and all need to pull (at the metaphorical oars) together. Frankly there is no place for them either wherever they may have been born. Citizenship ought properly be a right which is earned, not conferred by birth. Those who refuse to take up the responsibilities of citizenship should first of all be deprived of its benefits, then (if they continue in their unmended ways) be deported – in the unlikely case that anyone would want them, any more than anyone (else) would want to employ those who ‘work’ for the ABC!

25/06/2020: The Ultralight Hairdresser: Of course you could just go about with your hair looking like an untidy birds' nest but few girls especially would want to. I have carried the same old comb below (3 grams) for twenty years. I own that I could probably have found a slightly shorter, lighter one but there is some sentimental attachment.

The broken tooth was courtesy of my daughter Irralee when Canoeing the Seaforth on the Dusky Track (2009) as she had forgotten to bring something for her hair! Memories. https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/25/the-ultralight-hairdresser/

25/06/2020: Teddy Roosevelt was the first President to invite his black American friend (Booker T Washington) to dinner at the White House something the Democrats decried for years, yet the mob wants to take his statue down: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=253&v=cxxHV5vu1Mo&feature=emb_title

25/06/2020: About the folly of rushing into a hydrogen economy: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/24/hasten-slowly-with-hydrogen/ Surely we have already had enough Green disasters. I would just like to continue to fill up my tank with Super for a little while longer yet.

25/06/2020: The Political Genius of Donald Trump (arguably the greatest President ever), ‘The Democrat’s ‘latest presidential candidate looks as if he has just wandered out of a retirement home with an idea of what he’d like for lunch but no idea of how to get to the dining room.’: https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/06/the_political_genius_of_donald_trump.html

24/06/2020: Just what you need, a Pocket Sized Bottle Rope Maker: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/grimworkshop/pocket-sized-plastic-bottle-rope-maker-turn-trash-into-rope?fbclid=IwAR1NueTgoIm6DLEh34Ov5uOovDdqK6Qkf32iL9W9UsFrp2z9DmMXn0OLlOY&ref=6teva8 When one thinks about the many wonderful uses to which used drink bottles can be put (eg bottle rockets) one wonders that any are thrown away ever.

24/06/2020: I warned at the start (Xmas) before anyone had shut their borders that if countries did not act it could be worse than a World War. Now the US death toll has exceeded lives lost in WW1 and continues to climb, as it does elsewhere. Though the first million cases took months to accumulate, the last one million cases only took eight days to add. The next will take much less than a week…All the more reason to take our own lock-down and elimination strategies extremely seriously. Government needs to ramp up the punishments for disobeying health orders. I really did mean shoot people if they will not obey when I said so the other day. If people insist on walking around with a loaded virus firing it willy-nilly, what can they expect? Now we learn that many of those who recover will be maimed for life: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/06/one-in-three-hospitalized-with-covid-may-be-harmed-for-life-say-uk-docs/ of course, not everyone agrees. I could be wrong: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/23/welcome-to-idiocracy/ & https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/23/did-lockdowns-really-save-3-million-covid-19-deaths-as-flaxman-et-al-claim/ but there are still an awful lot of people getting sick and dying.

24/06/2020: Unpunished rapist Bill Shorten pontificates that Heydon should be stripped of Australia Day honours (just for being accused). That’s just a bit rich. When’s your day in court, Bill? I’m sure your victim, Kathy is just loving your high-mindedness. Look I seriously do think the punishment should follow the trial and verdict, not occur before – but I also think there should be a trial, not what your political mates can just fix it whatever you do so you just go free. I don’t know what Heydon did, if anything. Perhaps some girls simply needed to ‘man up’. Perhaps he is/was a creep who richly deserved a thrashing behind the pub long ago. But Gillard and Shorten (for example) have walked free of a heap of crimes for far too long – and been honoured. The evidence against them is overwhelming, (as incidentally Heydon found out, interestingly. Bill and Julia certainly looked pretty uncomfortable in his dock. Payback perhaps): https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/06/accused-sex-offender-bill-shorten-pretends-to-take-the-high-moral-ground-on-sexual-harassment.html

23/06/2020: What a loss Michael Crichton’s death was. 20 Years On, Jurassic Park Author Michael Crichton is Still Right about Global Warming: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/09/aliens-cause-global-warming-a-caltech-lecture-by-michael-crichton/

23/06/2020: The Greens are still in favour of slavery (as well as numerous other awful evils such as mass murder (For example, they have killed 100 million people from malaria alone through their ban on various safe insecticides). The Greens must be destroyed: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/21/blood-batteries-climate-advocates-grappling-with-the-gruesome-extractive-price-of-renewable-energy/

23/06/2020: Scott is going to shut down Arts faculties no longer bastions of ‘the best that has been thought and said’ but breeding grounds of communist and anarchist insurrection. Will he also shut down the ABC and SBS too please so that the rest of us can get on with building productive lives?

22/06/2020: A Hobo in a Roller: If you are a really up-market hobo you can buy this ready-made Tomshoo Brand titanium (of course) hobo stove from Aliexpress for US$14.94 (June 2020). It weighs 55 grams (1.9 oz). Dimensions are : 80 mm (high) x 91 mm (dia) / 3.15 x 3.58 in – so a little smaller than mine 1250mm x 100 mm / 5″ x 4″ (height/dia) and 92 grams (but free). https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/22/a-hobo-in-a-roller/

22/06/2020: Yet Another Green Evil: ‘There is growing pressure on the Australian Royal Commission investigating Bushfires to investigate how greens in positions of authority allegedly hijacked forestry management, to frustrate efforts to protect property and lives by back burning, to manage forest fuel load’. The Greens must be destroyed, (to plagiarise Cato – and Carthage): https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/19/sky-news-aussie-royal-commission-to-investigate-climate-activist-hijacking-of-forestry-management/

22/06/2020: Whose lives matter? ‘In 2018, there were over 600,000 violent incidents between black people and white people. In nine out of ten of those black people were the offenders and white people were the victims of the violence’. Thoughts from a couple of prominent African American intellectuals: Booker T Washington 1911: ‘There is another class of coloured people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs – partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs.’ Thomas Sowell 2020, ‘Racism is not dead, but it is on life support — kept alive by politicians, race hustlers and people who get a sense of superiority by denouncing others as racists.’ https://rosebyanyothernameblog.wordpress.com/2020/06/20/black-lies-matter/

22/06/2020: Two weeks and now the second wave: Thanks a lot George Floyd. As if it weren’t enough that this piece of criminal scum wasn’t simply drowned at birth which would be the best idea for such ferals, (or preventing their breeding in the first place), people defying Covid 19 restrictions beginning with the absurd communist BLM protests but rippling outwards from there as authorities proved to be ‘paper tigers’ have brought us (not just here in Victoria – lots of places) a second wave. Just when we about had this thing extinct in Australia too. If we can’t contain it and I have my doubts now that the paper tiger is loose all will have been in vain. We can just stand back and watch the death toll climb as it has elsewhere. Gladys, close the borders. Dan, lock Melbourne down. Ban travel to the disease free regions. Fine the bejesus out of anyone wanting to defy the rules. Shoot them if necessary. There is still a chance we might nip this in the bud.

21/06/2020: A Caldera Cosy: You will have seen the Jetboil and similar devices supposed to save fuel. I suppose they do but there is something wrong with the whole concept of carrying canister stoves. This ‘device’ saves fuel on an alcohol stove.

I have made one for my caldera cone which is an important component of my Cookset but soon to be upgraded my myself to an improved model. My ‘cosy’ will still fit however as I won’t be changing my pot.

I have made this truncated cone ‘cosy’ from a piece of carbon felt (because it is insulating but doesn’t burn) to see how much fuel would be saved if all the waste heat that escapes out the top of the cone and along the sides of the pot had to be directed into the water in the pot. https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/20/a-caldera-cosy/

21/06/2020: There are two kinds of people… http://maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com/archives/35123-There-Are-Two-Kinds-of-People.-People-Who-Divide-People-Into-Two-Kinds-of-People....html

21/06/2020: Why 536 AD (not 2020) was the worst year ever: https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2018/11/why-536-was-worst-year-be-alive

21/06/2020: Covid 19: If you look at Mauritius' data (still the most successful country i am familiar with) they had no cases for a whole month - but it was clearly still 'lurking'. This is a nasty, deadly disease. The fight against it is not over. Look around the world at the hundreds of thousands of lives it is still burning away (and it could suddenly mutate into an even deadlier strain). I remind you that our parents (whom I posted about just two days ago had to endure 6 years of WW2. Sometimes fights can be long and unpleasant but they must be endured. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/mauritius/

21/06/2020: Wonnangatta Disappearances #14: Since the ‘botched’ search for the missing autistic boy Andrew Rule seems to have leaned more back towards natural causes (and away from his ‘Button Man’) to account for Russell and Carol’s disappearance. There is one ‘new’ element in Andrew’s report concerning the car keys. It had always been reported that the vehicle was found with car keys ‘inside’ it ie (I assumed) unlocked. Andrew now claims it was locked but with (spare) hidden keys. If Russell had the keys ‘in his pocket’ (as Andrew says) this makes one lean towards believing they disappeared in the bush without other human intervention and the search just failed to find them. Of course the keys (and other items) could also have been taken away by a third party (eg to enhance the mystery). The matter is so redolent of the earlier (unsolved) murder in 1917 (read Wiki) that it will continue to haunt us. If their bodies are still lying somewhere (lost) in the Wonnangatta bush I guess it is likely some hunter will find them during the next hunting season. The gates are now locked until November. https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/police-courts/others-in-wonnangatta-valley-could-hold-key-to-missing-camper-mystery/news-story/18e03a60915f689fa25deae9c9a2ae8f & https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wonnangatta_murders PS: I have since read this morning's Herald Sun and there is another piece of information contained in the teaser' to the story above: that Russell's hat was found on the dash of his car. Now, if he went for a walk during the day he would very likely have taken his hat. I also always lock my car when I go to bed even when camping in the bush. These two items (keys and hat) taken together indicate strongly to me that they disappeared the night before and that there was foul play. BTW. I had 'forgotten' (early reports were confused) that police did not arrive on the scene for days. The trail was definitely cold by then, and no doubt lots of other campers had thoroughly confused the 'crime' scene, so police have definitely had a difficult case to solve here. Hopefully they have some clues we don't know about from phone evidence etc.My wife is definitely more reluctant to visit the Wonnangatta we love until this 'mystery' is solved - if it ever is though. The 1917 murders (they certainly were) are still unsolved

20/06/2020: Our own JR, ‘Spot’ won’t like this. You Can Now Buy Spot the Robot Dog—If You’ve Got $74,500: https://www.wired.com/story/you-can-now-buy-spot-the-robot-dog/

20/06/2020: Rejuvenation: This sounds promising, ‘Replacing half of the blood plasma of old mice with a mixture of saline and albumin…has the same or stronger rejuvenation effects on the brain, liver and muscle than…young blood exchange’: https://news.berkeley.edu/2020/06/15/diluting-blood-plasma-rejuvenates-tissue-reverses-aging-in-mice/

20/06/2020: Do the descendants of Australian slaves feel that there has ever been ‘systemic racism’ or that they have been given a raw deal? No, they don’t: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/bennelong-papers/2020/06/systemic-welfare-not-racism-is-the-real-issue/ However, the whole idea that such (‘blackbird’) slavery occurred at all is an invention. Read historian Keith Windschuttle’s depiction of the real history of this phenomenon: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/bennelong-papers/2020/06/the-myths-of-south-seas-slavery-in-australia/ Interestingly the Guardian which has been instrumental in concocting this slavery meme is being forced to shut down on account of its founder having been made rich by slaves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=blAqycSix8U&feature=emb_title The same phenomenon informs the American debate on this: Most people might not realise that it was the Democrats who were pro-slavery and the Republicans who were abolitionists!

19/06/2020: A Hobo’s Breakfast: It costs nothing at all (and only a couple of minutes) to create your own safe wood burning hiking stove which will cook you up a wonderful breakfast (below) in just a few minutes without having to carry any fuel at all (or any other stove) with you into the wilderness. A big saving.

You only need a few simple hand tools such as those pictured (or similar) which I’m sure you have in your kitchen or workshop. A can opener which will cut out the side of the can (not the top). A ‘church key’ such as used to be used for opening beer cans (Remember?) and a pair of super-tough scissors (or tin snips) for completing the stove ‘door’ opening: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/18/a-hobos-breakfast/

19/06/2020: London 1945: Della’s lovely mother Dorothy was there (all through the Blitz - her home was blown to smithereens above her head), one of the many pretty young women in the crowds who celebrated in the streets whilst Vera sang this (we both peer through the footage looking for her), but the ‘boys’ were still away (Della’s father Bill’s war had by then moved from North Africa to Northern Italy and beyond). Now they are all gone. Alas. But deeply missed. There will never be another generation like them. How they could smile in adversity yet carry on, and never afterwards hark back to their suffering, whilst today’s generations mope if the smallest trifle is withheld from their amusement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qhLPWcm-0w&feature=emb_title

19/06/2020:

19/06/2020: Congratulations to everyone who guessed rightly which founder of a major world religion was a slave owner and advocated slavery (his religion still does). Unfortunately (?) there are no statues or images of him to be torn down (in fact you can be murdered for creating one) but perhaps people should be banned from being named after him.

18/06/2020: Mostly Perspiration: According to Thomas Edison that’s what genius is – and he should have known, with his 2,000 patents. Each took countless experiments, lots of trials and error before he got it right. Tim Tinker is the Thomas Edison of the ultralight tent stove. For years he has been working away at his miniature radiative beauties in his eternal quest for the perfect stove. I would like to showcase just two of his many creations: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/17/mostly-perspiration/

18/06/2020: A Lava Bomb Map. Fascinating: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58893

18/06/2020: Everyone’s life matters: Watch a 15 year old girl being savagely attacked by thugs at a major Melbourne railway station – and police will do nothing: Avi Yemeni - Why are they hiding the violent attack from you? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjF52T6Qtes

18/06/2020: If you behave this way towards police officers whether you are black, white brindle or orange, you deserve to be shot down like a mad dog. That is all: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/06/deadly-force-was-justified-as-this-crook-tries-to-choke-a-nsw-policewoman-to-death.html

18/06/2020: Calling out BLM. A very well –reasoned letter from a black History Prof who thinks that this movement is the worst thing to come along for black people since slavery, ‘If we claim that the criminal justice system is white-supremacist, why is it that Asian Americans, Indian Americans, and Nigerian Americans are incarcerated at vastly lower rates than white Americans… As an example of the latter problem, consider the proportion of black incarcerated Americans. This proportion is often used to characterize the criminal justice system as anti-black. However, if we use the precise same methodology, we would have to conclude that the criminal justice system is even more anti-male than it is anti-black.’ https://rosebyanyothernameblog.wordpress.com/2020/06/12/a-letter-smuggled-out-from-the-berkeley-gulag/

17/06/2020: Small Game: Was once the bushman’s standy-by. It is usually abundant, enormously varied, relatively easily to take, involves little waste or preparation and is varied and nutritious. Of course much of it is also illegal. You will notice that in my post about the journey to Cromarty not so long ago everyone used to take a rifle to obtain extra food on the journey

It is a bizarre contradiction really that the folks (who require such bans and who mandate such poor management of public lands through ‘conservation’ strategies such as National Parks) should also be responsible thereby for the episodic vastly destructive wildfires which are so destructive of such wildlife – whilst the larger animals (deemed pests by the same folk) such as deer and brumbies survive better.

Where (and when) game is plentiful though (and only being reserved for the next apocalyptic inferno anyway) and considering 90+% of every season’s annual production would normally only perish over the lean seasons of winter/summer through starvation also, I see no rational reason why one’s larder ought not be supplemented with it – as it always used to be… https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/17/small-game/

17/06/2020: Feral Humans? Of course there are. And just as the nation was once over-run and eaten out by rabbits and is till beset by countless other pests: foxes, wombats, kangaroos, corellas, etc we also have a plague of unproductive and destructive people. It is so much easier to destroy a thing than make it. Some people just excel at this, and particularly at destroying value, not least financial value. How easy is it to burn money?

One of the chiefest reasons I am opposed to the welfare system is that it is all about waste: wasting money and wasting people’s lives. Lives which might be made better through productive work and self-improvement, but instead they are made into ‘ferals’ unable or unwilling to contribute meaningfully to society and simply become a drain on it.

‘Free stuff’ is just social and economic lunacy. It is certainly never going to make for human betterment. It is nothing like the just rewards of hard work and personal effort. It is also quite insane to simply pay people to breed. If that is all that people are ‘good for’ – and the results clearly show they are not very food for that, they should not be permitted or encouraged to breed – as a livestock breeder I would soon be broke if I followed that sort of selective breeding practice as our welfare system promotes (and so will our society be too).

I know that most every responsible productive working woman uses some sort of effective family planning strategy so that they only bring children into the world who are wanted and whom they can support and nurture. Many use the long-acting implantable contraception which has been available now for years. These last for more than a year.

Instead of society simply being ‘obliged’ to provide for the unwanted children of the welfare classes, I think it would be more than reasonable if women of breeding age who are recipients of welfare were required to annually submit a doctor’s certificate attesting that they had a current such implant to prevent pregnancy as a condition of receiving welfare.

It is one thing to be unable or unwilling to support yourself (and so become a burden to others). It is quite another to willy-nilly bring more of your like into the world to increase that unwanted burden even further.

You should understand I only consider this an interim step: I want to abolish the welfare system altogether and move people on to productive lives. We need to use both the goad and the reward to achieve this but achieve it we must before we are quite over-run.

Already we have nearly 50% of the population on some sort of welfare or another. Sometimes this is just a nonsensical ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul’ whilst at the same time robbing Paul to pay Peter – with the only advantage going to the ‘bean-counters’ and other parasites who maintain the system..

17/06/2020: Should farming be banned: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/15/farmers-fear-the-european-green-deal/

17/06/2020: Dexamethasone: Some good Covid 19 News for once: https://www.9news.com.au/world/coronavirus-treatment-updates-dexamethasone-breakthrough-from-uk-scientists/6f637d91-857f-40c2-9565-aef03e072e95

16/06/2020: Remove the historical statues or remove separate ‘indigenous’ (ie racist) funding? It is our common history, warts and all – and should never be forgotten or papered over. I have enough problems accepting that people should be funded according to ‘need’ when all my instinct tells me that ‘suffering’ is just the ‘sauce’ that people ‘need’ to encourage them to make an effort to get themselves out from under whatever terrible situation they might ‘find’ themselves in, become like the rest of us who have pulled ourselves up ‘by our own bootstraps’, ‘stood on our own two feet’ and ‘given life as good as you get’…but I can accept funding according to ‘need’ for some things - perhaps eg old age pensions for those who are already far too old to meaningfully make a contribution any more, but I cannot accept funding based on ‘race’. This must be abolished: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/statues-destroyed-overseas-reignite-debate-over-victorias-colonial-monuments/news-story/061da1ecead13da0eb5230c8bd8b5ae6

16/06/2020: China lost a lot more people than their official stats revealed. People would be much less angry with China about the virus and the economic melt-down it caused if they would just ‘fess up to this. Xi is the problem (a damned big problem, perhaps WW3 in scale – who knows?) but instead of ramping up the tension Xi how about trying to calm things down a bit, or is the internal situation in China so dire that you need to create an external threat to cling on to power as previous dictators have tried to do (usually unsuccessfully in the end): http://joannenova.com.au/2020/06/estimates-from-crematoria-and-urns-in-china-of-2-2-million-cases-36000-dead/

16/06/2020: Another perspective: David Leyonhjelm is right (as usual). Likely it is true that in the long-term no lives have been saved at all (just deaths deferred) but economies have been destroyed which almost certainly costs more lifetimes than would be swallowed up by an epidemic which could have been better managed eg utilizing cheap available therapies and preventatives, such as I have discussed here many times. I am surprised no-one has mentioned (to date) for example) the utility of negative ion generators in removing (infective) particles from the air indoors: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/14/david-leyonhjelm-stop-listening-to-public-health-doctors/

15/06/2020: Plumbing the Depths: You can repurpose many humble plumbing fittings into wonderful ultralight hiking tools. Take this cheap 19mm (3/4″) irrigation tee from Bunnings for A$1.54 (June 2020) .

I have carried one to sit the sharp end of my hiking pole in so it doesn’t pierce the floor of my tent. An end joiner works well for that purpose too – and is lighter. You can set it up to start with using your cook pot, then switch after you have your tent pegs in.

They are also just excellent for driving a tent stake into hard ground without damaging the stake – or your hand! This one weighs 14 grams. https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/14/plumbing-the-depths/

15/06/2020: Low Dose Radiation for Coronavirus: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/06/low-dose-radiation-may-save-people-from-coronavirus/ Another perspective: David Leyonhjelm is right (as usual). Likely in the long-term no lives have been saved at all (just deaths deferred) but economies have been destroyed which almost certainly costs more lifetimes than would be swallowed up by an epidemic which could have been better managed. I am surprised no-one as mentioned (to date) for example) the utility of negative ion generators in removing (infective) particles from the air.: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/14/david-leyonhjelm-stop-listening-to-public-health-doctors/

15/06/2020: Wonnangatta Murders: Vicpol is not exactly ‘quick off the block’. It ought to have been clear to any competent intelligent observer that two murders had been committed when their burned ot campsite was discovered at 2pm back on 20^st March. They started looking ofr people/evidence far too late in the day. If they don’t know who did it by now they are really up against it in solving this one. My guess is that they do, but the evidence has been allowed to wither on the vine: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/police-courts/police-believe-russell-hill-and-carol-clay-met-with-foul-play-in-high-country/news-story/91216a7379a8cebf96f62f2bb1c098bc PS: I know that their search procedures are clearly crap (as evidenced by the recent failure to locate a missing boy), but two elderly people do not just disappear in such suspicious circumstances as this.

14/06/2020: Is Falconio actually still alive? Stranger things have happened. I admit I hadn’t heard this one though credible witnesses who reported seeing him after his death, the absence of a body, Lees’ more than somewhat bizarre and changing accounts, the appearance and disappearance of police evidence, highly questionable DNA, many aboriginal witnesses (whose testimony supported Murdock) and etc all cast the rather unpleasant Murdock’s guilt into serious question. If he had been anywhere near as attractive as Lindy Chamberlain he would long since have been freed: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/crimeinfocus/youre-not-getting-those-four-hours-back-viewers-trash-peter-falconio-documentary/news-story/0c68974a37f71f27ccb725e0013a52fe

14/06/2020: Winston S. Churchill (whose memory it seems ought’ to be obliterated): ‘An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last…Each one hopes that of he feeds the crocodile enough the crocodile will eat him last. All of them hope that the storm will pass before their turn comes to be devoured. But I fear – I fear greatly – the storm will not pass. It will rage and it will roar, even more loudly, even more wildly.’

14/06/2020: A couple of important vids about the current protests, one from John Cleese: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/13/questions-that-need-answers/ and this: Joe Biden Says George Floyd’s Death is Bigger than Assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/06/wth-joe-biden-says-george-floyds-death-bigger-assassination-dr-martin-luther-king-jr-video/ Baloney!

13/06/2020: All Thumbs: Sick of burning your thumb when lighting the fire or the stove with your Mini Bic? I know I am. Here’s the ultralight (1.5 gram) solution. J. Burrows’ Thimblettes from office supplies for just 64 cents each. You can store one on the end of the lighter (as shown) so it is easy to find. One has already gone into my cookset: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/13/all-thumbs/

13/06/2020: Moving on and rising above rather than rising up: I’m sure most of us have bad things in our personal pasts which we can still only recall with anguish. I know my own father’s terrible protracted death when I was 13 remains a pivotal one such for me – and I have had others, but so has everyone else unless you have lived a particularly blessed life.

Again most of us are of mixed race or at least mixed heritage and there are terrible things in our pasts in the C18th, C19th and particularly the C20th. Very few of these things were the fault of anyone living today. Their causes and effects are a matter for scholarly conjecture not for iconoclasm (or monument desecration).

My Irish ancestors (I am 3/8ths ‘Irish’ – whatever that may be) endured the terrible potato famine in which so many (of their relatives and friends) perished for example. My (4/8ths) English ancestors (my patrimonial) originating near Ely in Cambridgeshire endured the enclosure movements and the many excesses of the Industrial Revolution (though it did eventually bring wonderful benefits). In a twinkling they all disappeared from the tiny village of Stuntney (near Ely) where they had bided for many centuries - in a twinkling, scattered (by the enclosure movements) to the large metropolises and the colonies, (or dead).

When the Romans arrived Stuntney was deep in the marshes where (later) Hereward (no doubt a remote ancestor) made his last stand against the Normans, earning him the memorial (on his headstone) ‘the last of the English Men’ – meaning in those days the ‘Britons’, ie those who were there before any of Celts, Romans, Saxons etc. There remain no Joneses at all there today though they probably watched the Romans building their causeway across the marshes to their village, but there are many of us elsewhere.

My 1/8th French ancestor endured the Franco-Prussian War (he was decorated) before migrating to Australia. They lost their first born in the West Australian bush and moved on – he to a distinguished career in (self-taught) civil engineering in NSW. He was affectionately known by those who knew him as ‘the Negro Frenchman’ (for obvious reasons). I never met him but my father’s generation grew up on his knee, learning to sing the Marseillaise before they could read and write.

When I was growing up all the older people around me always urged me to emulate him. It was always glowed with a sense of pride to any praise that some thing I had done showed that I was a ‘true Sanlaville’ (his patrimonial) even though he was definitely what we used to call ‘touched with the tar brush’. This was not then (probably ever) any ‘bar sinister’ or impediment (still less is it today), nor anything any friends or relatives took any notice of at all (let alone adverse).

Those C18th and C19th colonists to Australia endured many deprivations, not least that they never, ever saw their own parents ofr grandparents (or any friends) again ever. I should also mention this: Watkins Tench who was on the First Fleet and left with the Second wrote a beautiful record of those early days (you can read his accounts for free here: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3534 ). Amongst many interesting snippets you will find there are his descriptions of the awful ‘plagues’ which consumed the native inhabitants of Port Jackson: measles, small pox, etc). They died en masse – despite every effort to assist them.

He reports that he colonists took up their orphaned children and raised them as their own (giving them their names too), as you would. As any decent human being has always done! Della had ancestors on the First Fleet and relatives ‘born’ in those early days. There is no telling whether they were a part of this generation of orphans. Who needs to know? They were all precious to their parents and to their descendants and friends.

More recent generations (my parents for example) lived through truly calamitous events in the C20th: the Russian and Chinese revolutions, the great depression the two World Wars. I had uncles in service in various theatres of war and a relative lost in the dreaded Sandakan Death March for example. Nonetheless I remember my parents’ generation as folk with an uninhibited sense of the joy of life; rather than being people dwelling on the dire experiences of the past, they ever taught us to look forward to a happier future.

The past is replete with intriguing stories, astonishing deeds, tales of awful sufferings. Many things. It should never be lost – or painted over. Neither though should it be dwelt upon, nor bizarre efforts at ‘reparation’ or recompense made. We would all be paying money with our right hand to our left hand (or vice versa) to compensate for the supposed ills visited on one ancestor by another!

That vile notion of ‘race’ which should have long since been relegated to the dust bin of history needs to be wholly expunged from our language and consciousness. We are all (as I sad yesterday) only members of the one human race. Instead of there being ‘recognition’ of ‘aborigines’ in our constitution or Departments of ‘Aboriginal and Torres Strait islanders Affairs’ and the like, there should only be Departments of Human Affairs.

Insofar as any amongst us is unfortunate enough as to need special assistance (for whatever reason: poverty, illness, disability, isolation etc) this should be available to all equally as a result of need, never ‘race’. Neither should any other ‘benefits’ devolve on people because of their supposed (often astonishingly minor) membership of any particular ‘race’.

13/06/2020: The wonders of modern technology: an entire Roman city mapped without any digging at all: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58829

13/06/2020: ‘Sidere mens eadem mutato’, Sydney university’s motto (‘The stars may change. The mind remains the same’) mocks from its sandstone plinth today. Della and I were both students there in the 1970s. Though one could see even then the seeds of its destruction creeping from the ground beneath the tree in the quad, it remained a great University, but now alas it is a hollow sham. Fortunately though some student’s minds seem capable of rising above this: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/06/my-universitys-betrayal-of-truth/

12/06/2020: Australians have a constitutional right to instant gratification.

12/06/2020: Good news for those struggling with home ownership: You Can Buy Land on Mars Only US$35/acre. Great value.

12/06/2020: ‘Patients in Wuhan, China, are being saved with high-dose vitamin C. In the U.S., you can get your Twitter or Facebook account deleted or your video scrubbed for even talking about it’ American Association of Physicians and Surgeons https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/08/big-tech-pandemic/

12/06/2020: I find all this historical ‘revisionism’ deeply worrying. The latest bid in the great aboriginal grievance poker antic is that somehow despite a ready supply of convict ‘slaves’ nonetheless aboriginals were slaves. Slavery was abolished throughout the Empire as long ago as 1833, but the convict system persisted for nearly another 50 years! Now, my great-great-grandfather was a convict. I am 1/16^th convict – a larger proportion than would qualify me as an ‘aboriginal’ ‘entitled’ to compensation. Della’s great-great- grandfather (on the First Fleet) was a member of the NSW Corps in charge of supervising convicts. Every day I seek and receive ‘compensation’ from her for this historic injustice. Of course I do. This fine-point nit-picking about ‘race’ has to stop. There simply are no ‘races’. There is only the human race – and the genetic relics within some of us (like me, eg of red hair and blue eyes) that reveal our ancestors once actually did breed with another ‘race’, the Neanderthals! But as regards breeding. I have been for most of my life a livestock breeder – and I like to think a fairly good one. When you are ‘grading up’ livestock (from a base breed) to another breed (which we do all the time), you cross and recross (three times) until you have reached: first ½, then ¾, finally 7/8ths purity at which point they are considered to be ‘pure’ of the ‘new’ breed. This is because for each generation, for any individual gene (eg the black gene in sheep, deemed undesirable because of the cost of bleaching the wool before it is dyed, not because blacks are ‘inferior’) only half of the progeny carry the gene. The next generation only a quarter of the offspring carry it, the third generation only an eighth carry it – and so on. So to consider yourself one-eighth anything (whether convict or aboriginal – supposing such things were heritable, which they are not!) belies the fact that you have less than one-eighth chance of carrying the gene at all (indeed it might not have been present in all of the original stock). Rather you have aan 87.5% chance of not being ‘aboriginal (for example) at all. Yet you may claim ‘aboriginality’ under current legislation if you are one thirty-second (or less through ‘identification’). This is racist cant. It simply flies in the face of reason and science – let alone common decency. You should instead ‘get a life’ and ‘stand on your own two legs’. The only people who have any claim to ‘aboriginality’ are those (few) who are 100% ‘aboriginal’ whatever that may mean, but it is long since time such petty grievances and fanciful notions were put firmly behind us and we all faced life on equal terms: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/rita-panahi/rita-panahi-how-latest-cultural-purge-is-rewriting-our-history/news-story/4ee01e60e662f8bff3a0cb87ccbf7320 & https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/11/jacques-barzun-on-affirmative-action-written-in-1956/

11/06/2020: The Last Straw: You can bend over the end of a drinking straw then if you fold it in along the middle slightly you can slip a cut off piece (say about 1" onto it to lock it in place. It will hold liquids such as iodine or sunscreen perfectly well, as well as powders such as salt, pepper and spices, or safety equipment such as matches, strikers, fore starters etc. I'm sure many other uses could be imagined. https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/11/the-last-straw/

11/06/2020: Australia Felix (the fortunate’). Indeed: ‘Dawn over Mt William’, Von Guerrard’s vision. (PS: I often camp at the bottom of Von Guerrard creek in the Wonnangatta Valley, and when there I am always minded of his outstanding landscape paintings of beautiful remote places in Victoria. What a treasure they are). https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/reflections/2020/06/sacred-sites-or-forgotten-places/

11/06/2020: Mt Disappointment and the Wonnangatta ‘Murders’: I as stunned as you were that a two day ‘search’ by 400 people (obviously including the very same sort of ‘specialist’ police used in the Wonnangatta search) failed to find this 11 year old boy within less than 30 metres of clear going along the creek or adjacent to the Road 1. First the Herald Sun Photo. Then one taken from Google maps Satellite view, the third is also from Google maps showing the type of vegetation there.

Google Maps shows the distance from Road I to the creek to be approx 150 metres. You can’t imagine deer hunters taking more than 15 minutes to find a deer they had shot in that situation. Yet the searchers never found the boy even though he was not much more then 100 metres from his last seen location (not even the 300 metres the Herald Sun reports), barely out of sight, and you would definitely think a search would circle out from this location with the ‘known’ that lost children do not travel far and seek to hide in thick patches. Unsurprisingly he was found by a lone bushman who was not part of the official search. Well done Ben Gibbs.

This leads me to reprise Vicpol’s statement that the Wonnagatta ‘couple’ cannot be in the search area. Now while I think it is vanishingly unlikely that two older (experienced) people could both get lost and die close to a familiar camp, I can also see that Viocpol’s search protocols are absolutely hopeless. Vicpol is obviously largely headed up by and manned by complete idiots! I still think the most likely situation is that Russell and Carol were murdered and their bodies dumped, but after the finding of this child (if the gates were not now locked) I would be going up to the Wonnangatta myself for a few days to check out all the hollow trees and logs & etc in the vicinity of their campsite.

It just keeps happening, ie someone else finding the person (usually their body, alas) pretty much within sight of where they went missing - there have been several examples of this just in the last year alone. Vicpol's training and procedures need a serious shake up. I think clearly when someone goes missing Vicpol need immediately have procedures in place to to call on volunteers eg from Deer Hunting groups to search for them ie people who are used to actually being in the bush (without getting lost) and who are skilled at looking for things. Arrangements could be made for them to be paid for their loss of wages in just the same way as for volunteer fire fighters: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/bushman-hailed-a-hero-as-william-callaghan-found-on-mt-disappointment/news-story/831d6a10e6664bb954bb9f3dfbf5113c

11/06/2020: Experts:

10/06/2020: Skara Brae – What a wonder! https://archaeology-world.com/scottish-farmer-discovers-5000-year-old-lost-city/

0/06/2020: New Zealand is now free of Covid 19. Yesterday we had not a single case of community transmission. Right at the beginning of this epidemic (in December) I said we could avoid it, or eliminate it. It might be a good idea of the world paid a little more attention to what I say: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/06/virus-eliminated-nz-is-free/

10/06/2020: Few of us have no other ‘race’ in our genetic make-up. I know both Della and I do, as recently as our grandparents or great-grandparents - though it might not be obvious when you look at us, neither is it important to us one way or another: The only race we all belong to is the human race. It does not matter a jot whether you are black, white, orange, brindle or spotted - underneath we are all red. As Shylock says, ‘If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?’ I would rather see more of the laughter. Listen to Morgan Freeman and others on this video, please: What The Left Won't Tell You About The Plight Of Black People And The Myth Of Systemic Racism: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=292609615461210 Everyone’s lives matter. BLM is a profoundly racist movement no different really than the racist ideology of the KKK and the Nazis – whom all our parents and grandparents fought a hugely destructive war (over sixty million lives lost) to defeat. It frightens me (as it would have Martin Luther King) that these people once more seek to divide us.' PS: As I watched the clips in the video from Martin Luther King’s speeches I was reminded starkly of what a fine spiritual, inspirational, intellectual man he was whose life was exemplary and whose memory deserves to be cherished. It contrasted so starkly with the wretched life and character of the man who is currently being lionized as to seem to me tantamount to sacrilege. I think too that King’s violent assassination was so unjust and intentionsl, such a bizarre contrast to the facts and intentions of his life and death (as so too Ghandi, Lennon etc) that to ‘celebrate’ Floyd’s life as compared with King’s life just shows how much civilization has crumbled.

10/06/2020: Richardson: The Australian Honours List should never have contained this man. What does it say about us that we ‘honour’ folk like this? https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/06/neil-chenoweth-in-the-afr-today-richo-the-zurich-philanthropist-.html

09/06/2020: Ultralight Pot Lifter: I found this enchanting post on a chat forum this morning: ‘For the last 5 years I’ve been needlessly carrying this extra 0.40 Oz with my Evernew titanium pot. Now I can manage just fine with one handle’. – thank you Wayne Adelkopf‎. I do admire the lateral thinking here. It is just such genius which made America great! And Britain before it! Now solimpply called the ‘UK’. I do prefer ‘Great Britain’!

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And .4 of an ounce is 11.5 grams (which, if you have been following A Lazy Man’s Guide to Hiking and Hunting works out like this: ‘A saving of 10 grams now doesn’t seem so silly does it when you see that it is the same as shifting 100 kg (200 lbs) one metre (yard)!’ In this case 115 kg – try lifting that! (or just over 250 pounds) – a not inconsiderable amount!

09/06/2020: Have you seen the ASX this morning? Up nearly 200 points in a few minutes. What a lovely sea of green! There is hope! People should understand that this represents and improvement in the nation's savings and investment in the future. Every worker has a tithe on their income paid into superannuation for their retirement much of which must and should be clearly invested in our leading enterprises. We all share in their prosperity, and our retirement income depends on it.

09/06/2020: Protestors spell out the word “love’ with burning homes. Fake news or no this is just incredible. No civilization can long survive (or tolerate) this sort of thing. It requires so much less energy to destroy a thing than build it. Clearly many people need a serious lesson in the value of hard work and thrift. Too many have lived too long with free stuff provided by the insane largess of the public purse. In a truly free market people would soon learn what their true worth to society was. I think a degree of suffering (of having to live hand-to-mouth for example) would be a salutary lesson for many of the coddled generation who can do such dreadful things. What really is the value of public servants and folks on welfare for example? Once what necessary public servants society thought they needed (very few) were well paid so as to discourage corruption (Sure, that worked). But now armies of them are created as a reward to the party hacks and rag-tag followers for no good reason at all, each performing meaningless tasks that are of no conceivable ‘good’ to society. Why, in the C19th it was clear that a schoolmaster ought to be paid such a wage as would enable him to support (in modest comfort) a wife and children because his value to society was such as to merit this ie imparting necessary skills such as literacy and numeracy and important social values such as hard work, integrity, self-worth, respect for others,m service to one’s country & etc. But so few even attempt to do that now that it would be much more reasonable to make it clear to them (a salutary lesson) that their value to society is really much less than that of a plumber or electrician and even less than a cleaner or day labourer! And we expect teachers to be doing some socially useful work whose meaning we understand. Not so the vast army (outnumbering the real army by a couple of orders of magnitude) of several million public servants. As to the welfared class (another several million), what is their ‘social worth’?…don’t get me started. http://joannenova.com.au/2020/06/powerful-protesters-spell-out-love-with-burning-homes/

09/06/2020: The details about Christian Brueckner are just chilling and sickening. Surely the Left won’t make his prosecution another cause célèbre for hero worship like that of other scum they seem so fond of lately. I am just so disturbed by the awful reversals of values which appear to be going on all around me: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/madeleine-mccann-case-christian-brueckner-investigated-as-police-search-for-exgirlfriend/news-story/cf3e24ace7674716e94e6269970196c0

09/06/2020: Indeeed, let’s have a one month trial without police. I am all stocked up and ready, are you? I suspect that the shrieking, namby-pamby, limp-wristed leftist nutters clogging our streets at the moment and demanding the disbanding of police forces don’t realize that many of us own several .308s with which we could clear the streets of them pretty damned quickly if there were no police! https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/06/this-guy-changed-my-mind-lets-have-a-one-month-trial-with-no-police-give-him-a-go.html

08/06/2020: A Cure for Knee Pain? (Preliminary observations)‘Always listen to the experts – and then do something else’, as the old saying goes. I thought I had about tried just about everything with my knee/s (as with my back (in retrospect) and had about bitten the bullet that there was nothing for it but once again the dreaded knife – though I know that too is a solution replete with unsatisfactory outcomes, except for the surgeon’s new Porsche! The cold laser seemed to bring some relief, and an exercise cycle which I have not been as religious with using as I should (I’m sure an unsurprising revelation) had not been the ultimate panacea either, but a couple of scraps of information/wisdom niggled at the back of my mind. The orthopedic surgeon commented (aside) that they had no explanation why some folks were ‘bone on bone’ and yet free of pain (and disfunction) yet others not.. The same has been noticed about backs, and on autopsy of many other things besides. The body (and even more the mind) remains a great mystery still. Another person (referring to the benefits to be obtained from the cold laser device) said that I would (probably) have to learn to walk all over again. Like many simple truths such as ‘Give it time to heal’ one tends to ignore - when you begin to see some sort of benefit from something (such as the cold laser), and ‘less is more’ ie don’t overdo something which seems to have benefit. That is not necessarily how things work. Anyway I decided to have a go at learning to walk again. This is something (strangely enough) which I have emphasized again and again in my hunting advice – but one tends not always to listen to one’s own advice, or anyone else’s! Strange! About ten days ago I decided to try it out though. Now, particularly my left knee has hurt for the last seven years every time I put it down, so I thought, ‘What if I am putting it down wrongly?’ & ‘Can I walk without pain?’ So I decided to experiment. Like the hunting walking I always advocate, ‘Softly, softly’ is the way to go. Can I just glide ahead with as little impact as possible, taking small steps and walking on my‘toes’ (at least the balls of my feet) instead of clumping down with my heels as people are wont to do – with no pain. The answer is that I can. It may be (is) slower, and it may look strange. I have never been over-much concerned about what odd ideas others may have anyway. I long ago eschewed the common throng anyway – as Horace advised long ago (‘Odi profanum vulgus et arceo’). I have now switched to my Topo walking shoes (because they have no heels and so facilitate this odd method of locomotion), but…So far I have walked completely without pain for ten days! This is good! Try it! PS: Something I failed to mention: Never straighten your knee, or 'lock' it backwards. People often do this when they are standing. Always maintain the bent shape of the knee. Stand on your muscles, ligaments etc, not on your joints. They were never 'designed' to stand this sort of mistreatment. So too back. I have learned (now) that the chief cause of back pain is poor stance and weakening of core body muscles. PPS: Read also my previous ‘report about cold lasers here: I Kneed You Knee arthritis is ‘associated’ with inflamation. Evidently ‘no-one knows’ whether the inflamation is the cause of the arthritis or vice-versa or whether they just occur together. The pain however in my experience does not seem to be doing me ‘any good’. I endure it because I either value the aciviuty that brings it on (hiking, hunting etc) or need to do the thing that seems to bring it on eg work, for some other reason. But if I can go about my business whatever it is without the pain I would choose to do it. I only did not know that I could avoid the pain whilst remaining active. (Too much sitting has its negatives too). But this ‘creeping about’ I am doing at present allows me to do things I want or need to do without endureing the pain so to me it is a win-win – whether it is actually ‘doing me any good’ – whaterer that may mean I leave to the philosophers and the shamans.

08/06/2020: Peaceful Protest: only 27 Police Officers Injured! This from the BBC, clearly just as bad as our awful ABC. Is this the end of Western Civilisation? Police officers are assaulted and injured whilst carrying out their duties of protecting the public, and the culprits are not made to pay dearly? All this in defence of a piece of multiple-times gaoled criminal scum caught out of his head on drugs, carrying drugs, whilst committing a criminal offence, wandering the streets knowingly infected with Covid 19, resisting arrest...Why , I think it would be perfectly reasonable to shoot down a mad dog like that in the street on sight without further ado. No matter what race sex or creed they were. And that it would be a public service to do so - which might attract a modest reward! PS: I like that the horse bolted into the demonstrators. Good idea horse. Too bad the police rider was injured though. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-london-52954899

08/06/2020: White lives matter? ‘If you are getting arrested by the police for a violent crime, your chances of being killed by the cops are greater if you are white then if you are black. In 2015, for every thousand white people arrested for a violent crime, four white people were killed by police. In 2015, for every thousand black people arrested for a violent crime, two black people were killed by police.’ https://rosebyanyothernameblog.wordpress.com/2020/06/02/watching-violence-in-black-and-white/ & http://maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com/archives/35078-Is-it-your-protest-strategy-to-piss-me-off.html

08/06/2020: When Greens seize power reason and freedom take a back seat - German officials threaten Naomi Seibt with prison for ‘denialism’: ‘Hello, everyone. My name is Naomi Seibt and I am a new member at the Heartland Institute. And I’ve got very good news for you. The world is not ending because of climate change. In fact, 12 years from now we will still be around, casually taking photos on our iPhone 18s, Tweeting about the current President on Twitter and ranting about the latest celebrity gossip. However, we are currently being force-fed a very dystopian agenda of climate alarmism that tells us that we as humans are destroying the planet and that the young people especially have no future: that the animals are dying, that we are ruining nature.

I truly believe that many members of Antifa, Fridays for Future groups, Rebellion Extinction, I really believe that many of them have good intentions but they are genuinely scared of the world ending, and scared that their parents and grandparents are ruining the planet, that it’s breaking relationships, it’s breaking up families, and we at the Heartland Institute, we want to spread truth about the science behind climate realism, which is essentially the opposite of climate alarmism.

Many people are now actually developing mental disorders, and referring to it as eco-anxiety and eco-depression. And I believe it is important that we act now and change this entire mainstream narrative of fear-mongering and climate alarmism, because it’s basically just holding us hostage in our own brains.

With all of that said, don’t let an agenda that is trying to depict you as an energy-sucking leech on the planet get into your brain and take away all of your passionate spirit.

I don’t want you to panic. I want you to think.’ https://junkscience.com/2020/05/monckton-german-officials-threaten-naomi-seibt-with-prison-for-denialism/

07/06/2020: Ultralight Ultracheap Deer Hunting & Some Ripping Yarns: I am often approached by prospective deer hunters for advice, particularly about what they need to acquire before beginning hunting. How little both in weight and dollars do you need to spend (supposing you already actually own nothing – unlikely)? I have put together here some suggestions (with links to previous posts).

Here is a photo from many years ago (c1990) of me with a young stag taken off my foxhounds at the bottom of Deep Creek near Walhalla, Gippsland. Note ex-army boots, woolen trousers (patched), Aussie Disposals shirt & hat. The deer would have been shot with my old SMLE. One shot. Thirty yards. It is dead right where it was running. (More about this at bottom of page). Lesson: You don’t need to spend a fortune to (successfully) hunt deer: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/06/ultralight-ultracheap-deer-hunting/

07/06/2020: I very much fear there can be any justice for officers who struggled to apprehend and restrain drug crazed criminal George Floyd as he perpetuated his latest in a life of violent anti-social criminal mayhem and nihilism. Only the weirdest of lunatic Leftist revisionism could make him out a hero. Why blame the man for his vile conduct when you can blame the most wonderful society that has ever existed on earth?

07/06/2020: Folks are calling the BLM activists who smash things, assault the police, burn buildings, loot etc ‘anarchists’. I have no doubt there are some among their number who even style themselves such – but it is not so. The heirs of this C19th philosophy are not such philistines as these but your local cricket club, church and credit union who run their own affairs cooperatively with the willing participation of their members. That is what ‘anarchism’ really is. The perception that individuals acting collectively have no need to create or have an over-riding government. Frankly, such 'anarchy' is a good idea. There should be more of it, not less. As for the rabid abuse, smashing and looting - the people should quite properly take this matter into their own hands and bring a quick and fatal stop to it. It is not the right of the mindless mob to destroy what the quiet labor of many have faithfully built.

06/06/2020: A Hiking Food Compendium: Folks are always asking me, ‘What do you eat on the trail?’ I have posted about this again and again, but I just thought I would bring all my posts about this together as one compendium. When you get tired of eating all these you could just quit life or hiking I guess. These are mostly our own recipes (tried and true). I have freshened this post up a lot (04/06/2020)

A couple of these are to enjoy at home, but most are from dry ingredients which make the meal as light as possible (calories per gram is all!) and use supermarket bought rather than specialty hiking meals as they are both cheaper and tastier in my opinion: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/05/a-hiking-food-compendium/

06/06/2020: 06/06/2020: Let’s all Pretend: ‘Let’s all pretend that people still playing pretend beyond their 11th birthday say anything worth listening to...Let’s all pretend a Republican now serves as mayor of Minneapolis rather than for one day out of the last 59 years. Let’s all pretend Democrats do not enjoy a political monopoly over every big city plagued by the worst violence. Let’s all pretend white supremacists and Nazis and Russians destroyed American cities rather than the people who vote for the people saying white supremacists and Nazis and Russians destroyed American cities. Let’s all pretend that one cop’s inhumanity indicts the entirety of law enforcement but many activists’ violence says nothing about the protests… Let’s all pretend that a drugged-out man, who had just ripped off a store, with a long history of addiction and violent crime, including a home invasion in which he pressed a gun to a Hispanic woman’s stomach, demanded drugs and money, and ransacked her house as an accomplice pistol-whipped her, amounts to this generation’s Emmett Till’ https://spectator.org/americas-make-believe-moment-george-floyd-minneapolis-riots/ Candace Owens: ‘People out here really trying to make a meth and fentanyl user who dropped a white baggie during his arrest, and who once put a gun to a pregnant woman’s stomach -- and did 5 stints in prison -- the next Martin Luther King. I really cannot.’ Frankly anyone who thinks George Floyd does not deserve to be dead is seriously deluded!

06/06/2020: I have been advocating this for years: ‘If Australia is to survive and prosper, we need to close down Canberra. Just shut it down and send the departments and public servants to the 4 winds. Let the buildings remain empty as a monument to remind us of the costly errors made.’ https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/01/clusters/

06/06/2020: It’s not us you see: Humans do Ultimate Paris Lockdown, CO2 hits record high anyway: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/06/humans-do-ultimate-paris-lockdown-co2-hits-record-high-anyway/ Enjoy your Aircon and your SUV. Have a nice day!

05/06/2020: Surely Minneapolis, Of All Places, Must Have Cured Racism By Now? It is as far Left in the US (and always has been) and not be in the Peopele’s Republic of China or etc: https://www.manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2020-6-2-surely-minneapolis-of-all-places-must-have-cured-racism-by-now

05/06/2020: You may have thought day-old bread was pretty bad (29/5), but how about this 2,000 year old pita loaf: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58774 earlier post: (https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/29/english-bread-regulations-in-the-18th-century/)

05/06/2020: Robbing Peter to Pay Paul: I think this headline: ‘The Morrison Government's Scheme for Some Taxpayers to Pay for Other Taxpayers Home Renovations’ from Michael Smith’s excellent blog says it all!

05/06/2020: A Sense of Proportion: I guess the core thing about being ‘conservative’ (being ‘normal’ as I would view it is) a sense of proportion. Things having their place. Making an appropriate response to things. Measured. Considered. Not rushing hastily to ‘radical’ reactions or behaviours. Lots of things ‘offend’ me as being ‘out of place’, ‘inappropriate’ or just ‘bad manners’ as we once used to style it – though I do not ‘take offence’ – as has become fashionable.. I find for example that ‘snowflakes’ as we sometimes style a generation or type of person who can’t perhaps even take a mild joke (against themselves) can simultaneously rejoin with the vilest rejoinders or even violence. I had an example of that on one of my websites of just yesterday: I rejoined with a mild joke towards a young person who (refusing to bother reading carefully what I had written) had made one of your typical smart-aleck uninformed comments. His rejoinder was to (first) claim that I had started it (ie no sense of responsibility for his own actions) then launch into a (mildly unpleasant) ad hominem attack (‘attack’ is the right word). His behaviour was quite out of proportion (Badly brought up’ we once would have said) which I pointed out to him - on which he took his bat and ball and went away – but without offering an apology (still harbouring those bad manners, you see). I don’t ‘enjoy’ the news every morning because it is ‘reported’ by dreadfully one-eyed people with an axe to grind speaking in a dreadfully aggressive tone, emphasizing all the wrong words – or all the words (in a wholly inappropriate manner). Just basically beating me about the head with the news in a manner which once was reserved only for the ‘opinion’ pages, and even there in a much milder, more civilized manner. Of course here I am talking about the ABC/SBS mainly but we get ‘feed’ from all these other news ‘services’ where the like contagion seems to have taken over too. So with this ‘George Floyd’ phenomenon. Everything about it is totally out of proportion. Of course it is a pity when an alleged criminal dies in police custody or whilst being apprehended. It is also a pity when a policeman dies whilst performing like duties of arresting or detaining alleged criminals and the like. Neither of these are things most people would want happening but most people understand that though most everyone will want to and try to prevent them happening that nonetheless they will sometimes happen. That when they do they will be investigated in the normal way and if charges or other remedial action are needed this will occur, and finally if justice requires some punishment that this will happen too. We also understand that along the way there will be appropriate processes, rights of appeal and so on. Blowing one such event out of all proportion (even exaggerating it to the level of ‘tragedy’) just dismays me. When I see vast crowds of people inflamed (by such a mundane event even to acts of violence, pillage and looting and innocent people killed (not petty criminals) as a result of it (and its reporting) I almost despair. I would so like people to regain a sense of proportionate response to things. PS: I also lament degrading of language: a ‘Tragedy’ is when we (slowly & in detail) witness a worthy individual destroyed by forces (even his own character) beyond his control – it’s not just finding a body in the street or on the beach!

04/06/2020: Born With a Wooden Spoon in My Mouth: If your wife loses your ultralight titanium/aluminium hiking spoon whilst doing the washing up (while you are folding up the tent) in the Franklin-Gordon wilderness (as my lovely wife, Della did - and she will never be allowed to forget it, poor thing!) or a similar disaster strikes, then it might be a good idea to be carrying a spare...but one can hardly be expected to heft the extra enormous weight of another 9 grams, so here is a lovely 2 gram hiking spoon. https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/06/04/born-with-a-wooden-spoon-in-my-mouth/

04/06/2020: Wonderful objects out there waiting: an Einstein Ring. What next a Dyson Sphere? https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/06/03/astronomers-find-cosmic-golden-needle-buried-for-two-decades/

04/06/2020: The Genius of Mathematics: Just hard to believe how brilliant some people are: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srinivasa_Ramanujan & https://www.popularmechanics.com/…/conway-knot-problem-sol…/ See (Stephen Fry) film: The Man Who Knew Infinity: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hlXHwMgS06c Something to watch tonight when there is nothing worthwhile on TV!

04/06/2020: Yes we need a Royal Commission into the ABC. It is violently biased. It urgently needs to be reformed or abolished – so too SBS: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/02/we-urgently-need-a-royal-commission-into-the-abc/ All protests should be suspended until the curve of violence is flattened: http://americandigest.org/all-protests-should-be-suspended-until-the-curve-of-violence-is-flattened/

03/06/2020: A 9 kg Rabbit – and I did not even know you could house-train a coney: https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/home/pets/giant-pet-rabbit-cocoa-puff-almost-as-big-as-kids-photo/news-story/42c54a8d677a820bc37a98f99d3b990d

03/06/2020: About time: Prestigious medical journal urges outpatient use of hydroxychloroquine regimen for COVID-19: https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/coronavirus/hydroxychloroquine-plus-azithromycin?fbclid=IwAR3Nwk4ZxzCWzSq23TgQQapN8G6sscFGXVZeiDBhH8_nTThaR-CGb4y_iwA BTW: Looks like I will be getting out the sheep drench of Coronavirus hits around here. Trials show it is very effective with patients well after just four days: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/06/ivermectin-kills-headlice-and-also-coronavirus-in-a-few-early-trials/

03/06/2020: Rita Panahi: ‘One of Trump’s greatest assets is being blessed with deeply stupid enemies…Dozens of police officers have been attacked during the nationwide protests and at least six people have died, including African-American federal officer Patrick Underwood, but there’ll be no protests for his unlawful killing…The media…seem proudly clueless about the fact most Americans care about law and order and don’t want thugs, Antifa criminals or other anti-police activist groups terrorising them with impunity. https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/rita-panahi/rita-panahi-trumps-moves-soothe-lawabiding-americans/news-story/57ec1206093ee6f1d557c2c17577aef5 To avenge (the criminal) George Floyd, Joe Biden’s supporters murdered (worthy) black Americans Dave Patrick Underwood and David Dorn: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/03/they-aint-black/ I also like this (black lady) store owner’s take on ‘black lives matter’: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/06/black-woman-in-new-york-with-lecture-for-black-lives-matter-thugs.html

02/06/2020: My Kind of Sheriff Too: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/06/my-kinda-sheriff-our-people-like-have-guns-if-you-try-to-break-into-their-homes-im-recommending-they.html

02/06/2020: Keep up with your Vitamin C. As well as Vitamin D and Zinc Vitamin C really can cure acute respiratory illnesses: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/31/vitamin-c-in-covid-19-prevention/ NB: Vitamin D and Zinc Sulphate to prevent or cure Covid 19: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/04/vitamin-d3-and-the-chinese-virus-coronavirus/ & http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/race-to-cure-covid/

02/06/2020: I was glad to hear Trump call out Xi the other morning. The Communist dictatorship in China must end. It has brutally murdered at least a hundred million people, kept a billion people in the most awful tyranny and held that population in unnecessary poverty. Look at what the Chinese in Singapore, Taiwan (and once) Hong Kong have done without communism. If Trump succeeds in ending this awful tyranny as Reagan ended communism in Russia it will be his greatest achievement. Indeed the greatest political achievement in a century: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/29/do-people-generally-know-what-the-initials-ccp-stands-for/ Xi is beating the nationalist drum because he fears a rebellion at home. His troops have even just invaded part of India: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-52852509?SThisFB&fbclid=IwAR22WTvlPl5UZOMX46oy4o0v6DkDd1YdVuGsv9kkwsFpAiCnx2sB3gRMIE8 And note this too: Another ‘smoking gun’ for coronavirus shows it probably emanates from a Chinese Government laboratory. Xi is a monster: https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/coronavirus-may-have-been-created-in-a-wuhan-lab-genetic-engineering-experiment/news-story/6e0a211af696fa2f30d5e7306dbf4780

02/06/2020: My Kind of Sheriff Too: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/06/my-kinda-sheriff-our-people-like-have-guns-if-you-try-to-break-into-their-homes-im-recommending-they.html

02/06/2020: No, mindless insurrection is not ‘peaceful protest: https://www.weaselzippers.us/449653-black-firefighter-spent-his-life-savings-to-open-a-bar-then-minneapolis-looters-burned-it-down/ Fair Point Steve Kates: ‘My understanding of what took place is that that this chap Floyd commits some crime, gets arrested, resists arrest, is held down in a dangerously illegal way and dies. Autopsy says there were other factors in his death but still, we can all accept that in some important sense the cop well-exceeded permissible limits. So he should be suspended, prosecuted and if convicted jailed. No element in this story seems about the fact that George Floyd was black and the police were white. And then there are riots and looting, and the most interesting part of the scenes of looting is that not one of the looters appeared to be even slightly in fear of their lives, or even in fear of being arrested. What’s the plan going forward? To forbid a black person to be arrested by the police? To allow mobs to burn your cities down? What principle of justice follows from any of this that should now be introduced that wasn’t there before?’ https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/06/01/nihilism-on-the-streets-of-america/

01/06/2020: A Lazy Man’s Guide to Hiking and Hunting: Work equals force by distance, where a single newton of force represents the amount of force needed to move one kilogram one meter. The equivalent imperial unit is the foot-pound which is self-explanatory.

Image: Sisyphus: ‘In Greek mythology Sisyphus or Sisyphos was the king of Ephyra. He was punished for his self-aggrandizing craftiness and deceitfulness by being forced to roll an immense boulder up a hill only for it to roll down every time it neared the top, repeating this action for eternity.’ Wikipedia

An example, if you chose a pair of shoes which each weighs 100 grams (1/10^th of a kilogram) more (than another shoe) and you walk 20,000 half metre steps in a day, you have moved the equivalent of an extra tonne (1,000kg) during the course of the day (.1 x .5 x 20,000) a distance of one metre.

That is a lot of extra effort. If I asked you to shovel a tonne of manure from this pile here to that one a metre away there you would think it was a lot of work, and maybe wouldn’t want to do much else for the rest of the day! (It would be a pile approximately a cubic metre/yard say 3′ x3′ x 3′). But that’s just what 100 grams in each of a pair of shoes adds up to, yet you are likely carrying several kilogramss extra somewhere in your kit! How many tonnes of s—t is that? https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/31/a-lazy-mans-guide-to-hiking-and-hunting/

01/06/2020: Mars Here We Come. Go Dragon. (thirty seconds in): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZolorqY2AM

01/06/2020: ‘New’ Games With Irving Finkel: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58766

01/06/2020: Black Lives Don’t Matter. This is racist cant. Everyone’s lives, liberty and property matter. Neither am I denying right to peaceful protest but when protest becomes riot involving property damage, assaults on police and other persons such behaviour must be stamped out immediately if necessary by the reading of the ‘Riot Act’ followed by shooting directly into the crowd if they refuse to disperse – what the ‘Riot Act’ involves. I am also tired of the ‘excuses’ for such anti-social behaviour. If police sometimes act wrongly (or appear to) both of which are inevitable though every effort should be (and is) made to avoid them, the law must nonetheless be allowed to take its course. It took a year before a (black) policeman was charged with the murder of a (white) Australian for example, but in the present case it only took four days for a (white) policeman to be charged with the murder of a (black) man. There are (apparently) no other colours! The respective races of perpetrators and victims are properly irrelevant. Justice needs to take its course. There are also avenues of appeal and a right to peaceful protest if it appears not to be doing so, but this wholesale (organized) mayhem (by the extreme Left) is another matter entirely - and Trump gave one of his best speeches ever about it (and other things): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWQTv4v3aDI&feature=emb_title PS: I do not think what is happening is what Abraham Lincoln meant by this, ‘This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or exercise their revolutionary right to overthrow it.’ 1st inaugural address.

31/05/2020: 1400 Posts: My daughter Merrin started this blog for me four years ago on 26 May 2016 so I am surprised I/we have been so busy, but today this is my 1400th post! Just thought I would take a few lines to highlight the last 100 posts which have occurred over the last six months or so: I guess the highlight in our memories of the last 100 was our walk on the Everest Base Camp Trail back in November 2019. Now read on: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/30/1400-posts/

31/05/2020: Wonnagatta Murders (cont): A tiny bit of new information in the Herald-Sun this morning: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/police-courts/missing-campers-time-frame-narrowed-to-18hour-window/news-story/f14372ce134482e3ae4c265c01284d82

Police have narrowed the time frame a little. ‘Mr Hill talked via his radio with a friend at about 6.30pm on March 20…He spoke only briefly because darkness was descending and he wanted to set up the camp site. The next day, other High Country visitors came across their camp at about 2pm. They saw fire had destroyed a tent and camp furniture and had also scorched the side of Mr Hill’s Toyota LandCruiser. Those passers-by believe it had been out long enough to have gone cold. It was not smoking at that point... search and rescue squad officers, who have run major operations in the surrounding area, were convinced they would have found some trace of the friends if they were still there… it was possible something had gone wrong while the pair were out exploring the bush. But both getting into the kind of trouble which led to death was less likely… Investigators are now trying to track every person who was in the area.. there were a lot of people in the High Country that weekend… Mr Hill had been in the King Billy and Bluff Track area from March 13 to 16 on a separate solo visit with his new drone. He also took the drone on the trip with Ms Clay the next week… Anyone with any other information on the disappearance or who has any CCTV or dashcam footage can call Crime Stoppers.’

Sunset occurred on March 20 at Mt Hotham Vic at 7:22pm Twilight at 7:48pm https://www.timeanddate.com/sun/australia/melbourne?month=3&year=2020 Deep in the Wonnangatta Valley (which runs roughly North-South) and close up against the Western side in the narrow Dry Creek Valley, sunset/twilight would occur much earlier, at least an hour. When Russell said it was ‘getting dark’ so he could not talk for long that was right. After setting up camp there was definitely no time to fly, lose and search for a drone. If he had lost it before he would have mentioned that fact in his radio call and that he was about to go look for it (as well as setting up camp – impossible). If he had done so early in the morning they would never have been ‘lost’. They were not ‘lost. They were murdered and dumped.

‘The fire was cold…it was not smoking.’ The people who found the camp would have seen or smelled smoke/burning plastic (at the campsite) if the fire had occurred soon before 2pm, say since 10-11am. There is usually very little wind in the Wonnangatta valley The wind almost always blows from the West (when it does) but it reverses direction for a brief time around about dawn. A morning fire (quite a lot of black smoke from burning poly, vinyl canvas, sleeping bags etc) would hang low in the air all morning. (It takes quite while for the fog to lift (not until after 10 am usually) so even a fire at 8-9 should still have smoke hanging around at 1 pm as the people who found the camp were driving up or down the valley on their way in. I think it unlikely the fire occurred in the morning.

‘Search and rescue squad officers…were convinced they would have found some trace of the friends if they were still there’ exactly. They have been removed from the scene.

I suspect the murder and the fire occurred the night before in the tent probably after they had gone to bed and that their bodies were removed that night probably back up the Zeka Spur (the most likely place to dump them). Lots of people (almost all) arrive in the Wonnangatta on Saturday morning. Most people come up the Howitt Road and turn off at the Zeka Spur or they come in from Eaglevale. The couple came down the Zeka Spur (They came through Licola). Morning would be the worst time to (successfully) murder someone. If you did it under cover of darkness though and because you were already in the valley before dark and knew there were no other campers about (or who would see a fire) that is another matter.

You had followed them in from where they had camped on the night of the 19th probably the King Billy ‘Crossroads’ as Russell had camped there only a week before when he was planning this trip – Where they camped, moved (ie the couple’s movements on the 19th and 20th) is a crucial bit of information which there may be evidence for. The couple drove down the Zeka Spur in daylight with this person following (at a distance) behind them. Someone camped on the tops (eg at Howitt or Guy’s Hut) might have seen these two vehicles (or even have dashcam footage’ – which the police are seeking). They were either followed down the Howitt Rd to the Zeka Spur turn off (probably by a stranger) or up it (by someone known to them).

Once it was dark you could be sure of that no other campers were about ie no lights) and make your move. Approach on foot using the red light on your head torch. It would be easy to hit two elderly people over the heads with eg the back of an axe when they were lying in their swags. Easy enough to bring your ute up, drag them into the back, smooth over your tracks with a branch, set fire to the tent, make sure every trace was burned away (five minutes) - and be off up the Zeka Spur having already selected somewhere you could safely dump the bodies ie somewhere you can safely stop – there are lots of steep pinches where this would not be easy. You would also want to be able to see lights approaching, so not near a ‘blind’ bend. Possibly there is even a spot where you can get a vehicle off the road? Safer. I haven’t paid that much attention when I have driven up/down it (only a couple of times). I almost always drive in from Eaglevale (canoeing) or I walk in from the Moroka.

You could not afford to take the bodies downriver (too much chance of running into other campers) or out onto the Howitt Rd - ditto, clear country and a chance of a police/DELWP roadblock checking cars and hunting licences. So, the Zeka Spur almost certainly.

Clearly though (then) their bodies were also dumped (probably) on the Zeka Spur in the dark possibly using infra red lights (again) for concealment, as to do so in the early morning would invite discovery – as this is when ‘everyone’ arrives. (This is a fairly ‘professional’ job. Planned). It would be a tricky thing to conceal two bodies fairly quickly and well in the dark. If they are buried they will not have been buried deeply – and wild dogs may have scattered the site, somewhat making it easier to find now A careful search along the sides of that track may pay big dividends. The murderer should really go back and move them or check that they are well concealed, as when they are found lots of new evidence will be available to police.

PS: Russell's (though patchy) phone records and the drone footage on his home computer should confirm where he camped. From there it is an easy step to forensically examine the campsite for DNA traces (eg buried faeces) to confirm the spot - and whether anyone else's DNA is there too! Then police can recontruct the events precisely and the likely timing. I find it surprising that they did not arrive at Dry Creek until nearly dark on the 20th given that they left Pakenham at 7:30 am on the 19th - and presumably passed through Licola that day. (Talking t someone?)

The Howitt Road is much busier though than around King Billy etc. Whenever I have been up there someone comes by every few minutes so there ought to be lots of people who saw two cars (the first Russell's distinctive white Landcruiser) the second the murderer's) passing by clearly in daylight hours. From the time they arrived at Russell's (clearly planned) camp (say 6:00pm) you can guess they must have turned down the Zeka Track around 4:00pm, meaning they passed the Howitt Hut or Dimmick's Lookout just before then. There are so often people about up there. You would think someone must have seen them.

As well, the patchy phone records should show a 'handshake with Russell - and Carol's phone simultaneously. Likely the very next phone is the murderer, providing he had a phone. (When I had my CDMA phone it used to say what tower you were connected to - up there it would likely be the Hotham one). So, unless the police are exceedingly dim-witted (not impossible) they should know who the murderer is. His phone will also have 'shaken hands' with the transmitter sometime perhaps around midnight on the way out (when no-one else would be moving about)! The phone record is not enough (as we saw in the Ristevski case even when the murderer was the husband) but once they have the bodies and some other DNA evidence, he will be sprung - and we can all take to going back to the Wonnangatta camping safely!

31/05/2020: Time our pollies caught up with Mexico’s President who has banned all new ‘renewable’ connections to the grid: ‘These wind turbines mess up the landscape, produce little energy and are owned by private companies that are subsidized for it. One of the typical scams of the neoliberals’. You betcha: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/23/mexican-president-pulls-the-plug-on-renewable-energy-one-of-the-typical-scams-of-the-neoliberals/

31/05/2020: Ain’t it the truth? God I hate the luvvies of the ABC and such: The ABC asks: What did the Queen know about Gough Whitlam’s dismissal? She knew Australians loved it: Fraser by a majority of 55 – the largest in Australian history – against the ‘great Gough Whitlam’. What an ass!

https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/30/she-knew-australians-loved-it/

30/05/2020: Keweisi USB Amp Tester: This is a really handy piece of gear (18 grams). After you have bought it/them you are going to be throwing out a heap of other things! It measures the voltage and amperage through itself when plugged into a USB outlet and can time and add the total so that you can see how long it took to attain a certain number of milliamp hours of storage. https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/30/keweisi-usb-amp-tester/

30/05/2020: Who would have thought? Tiny plankton drive processes in the ocean that capture twice as much carbon as scientists thought. But 70% of the world is ocean: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/25/tiny-plankton-drive-processes-in-the-ocean-that-capture-twice-as-much-carbon-as-scientists-thought/ Where does it go when it’s cold: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/24/study-ancient-ocean-oxygen-levels-associated-with-changing-atmospheric-carbon-dioxide/

30/05/2020: CDC: Coronavirus fatality rate could be as low as 0.26%: https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/coronavirus/cdc-says-coronavirus-infection-fatality-rate-could-be-low-026-nearly & Former Israeli Health Minister: The COVID-19 Response Has Been “Monstrous Hysteria” Reaching to the Irrational: https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/05/former-israeli-health-minister-covid-19-response-monstrous-hysteria-reaching-irrational/

30/05/2020: Have to Agree With This: Andrews is an Economic Fool: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/27/daniel-andrews-is-an-economic-fool/

29/05/2020: Cookset Solutions: Today I am using the Gnomatic alcohol simmer stove below. It is available for US$25 (May 2020) plus freight and weighs 19 grams with the simmer ring. It is just about the best alcohol stove and simmer stove I have ever owned, and you do not have to worry about accidents because it is virtually spill-proof (because of the carbon felt inside) and wonderfully easy to light from the top (first time every time) without burning your fingers. Just make a flat level space on the ground with your thumb.

I have is set up inside a Trail Designs Caldera Cone (31 grams in this size). It fits either of my two pots the Evernew deep pot with frypan lid 900 ml at 123 grams (for one) or the Toaks Titanium 1100 ml at 156 grams (for two – big enough for us anyway. Both weights are including the lid. BTW If you need a second plate these are the cheapest and lightest I have found).

You also need two eg titanium shepherd’s hook tent pegs (total about 11 grams). https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/29/cookset-solutions/

29/05/2020: Why They banned fresh Bread: When we lived in NZ in 1975 this was a thing. You couldn’t buy fresh bread (or butter that wasn’t rancid – or practically anything else. Things are better there now, (despite Ardern) but: https://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/29/english-bread-regulations-in-the-18th-century/

29/05/2020: What is our military for? An astonishing insight: http://maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com/archives/35047-The-Last-Six-Seconds.html

29/05/2020: So RIO has blown up some ‘aboriginal’ site in the Pilbara: Practically every night on SBS there is a doco about excavating old sites in London/Melbourne etc from which much can be learned before a new multi-story building is constructed over them. At the moment they are working on digging up an old graveyard Sydney's Central Station was built over. I know that my great aunt is buried there. (My grandfather knew her – and inherited her dough!) I have not objected (nor should I) though I do intend to contact them in case they find her and have learned something I didn't know. Millions of people will benefit every year from the improvements to Central Station, so too the iron mining in the Pilbara!

28/05/2020: Astonishing: A Loon With the Heart of an Eagle: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-52779727

28/05/2020: Michael Moore’s new documentary, Planet of the Humans’ which just says about ‘renewables’ what the rest of us have know forever has been banned everywhere. This is what happens to you when you fall out with the green left who dominate social media platforms, wikipedia, the mainstream media etc, etc.: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/youtube-censorship-gone-wild-removing-michael-moores-documentary/ PS: You can still watch it her for free: https://www.bitchute.com/video/KQnVEMOOYuJd/

28/05/2020: Wonnangatta again: Vicpol seems to believe in fairies, alien abductions and such. Evidently they are seeking to eliminate the possibility that Russell and Carol won several million in the lottery, decided to run off together yet instead of simply doing just that, changed their bank accounts and identities, Russell planted another 4WD (by himself?) somewhere in the Wonnangatta then they drove out via Eaglevale and Black Snake Creek. Just possibly this was quite another ‘elderly couple’ who (like us) do not consider themselves particularly ‘elderly’ and so would not necessarily come forward even in the (likely) scenario that they had taken a quiet drive up the Wonnangatta Rd on March 22^nd. Apparently (unsurprisingly) they were not seen in the Wonnangatta Valley. Of course Vicpol does have to eliminate all the possibilities (however remote). It is very revealing though how interested they are in the doings in the Mt Howitt-Zeka Track area and in exactly when the fire occurred – as am I: https://www.police.vic.gov.au/appeal-visitors-wonnangatta-area-contact-police-investigation-missing-campers-continues?fbclid=IwAR3gSY2K87_AWOo96lV3d2Etltue8e1QbFjH6dV61TJwn2c2gWOWe0QcniE

27/05/2020: Neat Ultralight USB Light: These are an interesting emergency light at just a couple of grams each . They plug straight in to your ultralight power bank. Some of them have a touch switch. They are not as energy efficient as these 11 gram rechargeables but would make a good spare. You can buy them from Jaycar for A$9.95 for three: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/26/neat-ultralight-usb-light/

27/05/2020: Wonnangatta Murders: The Plot thickens: ‘Detectives have been able to confirm Mr Hill was camping alone in the area of the King Billy and Bluff Track between March 11 and 13. He was in his white Toyota LandCruiser and had his DJI Mavic drone with him on that trip.’ https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/fresh-clues-in-missing-camper-search/news-story/32245606102ef8be1505315f434bb8b9 This is indeed ‘The Crossroads’ the Button Man’s haunt mentioned in the earlier Age article where he was the last person to see missing lone hiker Niels Becker . What did Russell discover with that drone (or possibly discover) that led someone to stalk and kill them both? A marijuana plantation perhaps? (on top of a mountain?) Seems unlikely. Illegal wildlife trapping/trafficking? Something more sinister? I hope police are having a good look around that area. And looking for the dumped bodies adjacent to the tracks leading to/from the Wonnangatta where deer hunters or others are unlikely/forbidden to venture. PS: I have probably mentioned this before, but the only place they could be (and not be found) is in a hollow tree. It is vaguely possible that if they were sitting up (dead) inside a such a tree the wild dogs would not have approached them and scattered their bodies/clothing. However surely professional search teams are told to particularly check (look back when passing) such trees. I still think the chance of this being innocent is less than in a million. I wonder where they camped on he way up there? Did Russell go back to the Crossroads? NB: Button Man clearly has a 'thing' about people taking pictures. remember the story in the original Age story about his taking photographs of the photographer with his own camera while he slept.

Thanks for the link to your photos. (https://www.facebook.com/gerard.white.7/media_set?set=a.828773063845809&type=3&hc_location=ufi). I do intend to do posts about your trip in the future (and indeed have made a beginning - it is an enormous task!) The photos give something of an idea of the type of country where the Button Man has his camp and why someone might fly a drone there - just great scenic footage - nothing illegal needs to have been discovered. Just that the photography (twice perhaps) irrationally annoyed him - of course the murderer could also be a third person. I think the post March 20th 'sightings' are certainly of someone else - unless she 'hitched' out of there to Black Snake - but then she would have turned up at home! A murder/suicide is indeed possible, but you have to think of the unlikelihood of neither of their bodies being found in a search. it is one thing to hide someone else's body; much harder to hide your own.

I certainly think the fire was deliberate. However, the scenarios you envisage of she and Russell separating up there are very unlikely for elderly people who are good friends. If she 'wandered off' she would surely have followed a track and would have been picked up on the 20th. Either Russell has done this - but no bodies - or someone else. The link to the 'Crossroads' is very suspicious at the moment. I would like to know whether when the campsite was found burned out (2pm on the 20th it seems) whether people saw smoke in the sky ('Plastic' smoke hangs around quite a while - as does the smell) or if it was still warm/smouldering etc. Knowing whether the fire occurred that day or the night before is so crucial. Also was the drone controller at the campsite? Anything else interesting missing/present? One of Oz's great mysteries...

"The Crossroads" looking north from Mt Clear Track...King Billy Track to the right, Brocks Rd to the left. Bluff Track straight. There's a weather station somewhere to the right apparently that's where Button Man camps. The AAWT heads up just to the right of Bluff Track. This is at the base of King Billy No.2 straight ahead.

Police are seeking information: https://www.police.vic.gov.au/appeal-visitors-wonnangatta-area-contact-police-investigation-missing-campers-continues?fbclid=IwAR3gSY2K87_AWOo96lV3d2Etltue8e1QbFjH6dV61TJwn2c2gWOWe0QcniE

Crime Writer Andrew Rule Gives Some Details On The Mystery “Button Man” In The Victorian High Country On the Hot Breakfast: https://www.triplem.com.au/story/crime-writer-andrew-rule-gives-some-details-on-the-mystery-button-man-in-the-victorian-high-country-161688?fbclid=IwAR1WjxgbCVlctkaZWSZNR8VKVKFrftye2w7D03ZVgm4LxM8cvgmLtnbL47c

27/05/2020: A Day in the Life of Saint Greta (Without Petroleum Products): Is this really the future we all want? https://www.climategate.nl/2020/05/een-dag-uit-het-leven-van-planeetredstertje-greta/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=een-dag-uit-het-leven-van-planeetredstertje-greta

27/05/2020: Quote of the Week: ‘Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd.’ Voltaire

26/05/2020: A Plane That Flies for 100 Years: ‘It’s not for no reason that, in 2018, the Air Force announced it would retire its 62 ’80s-vintage B-1Bs bombers and 20 newer B-2 stealth bombers by the 2030s, while retaining the the updated (1962) B-52s alongside a fleet of at least 100 new B-21 stealth bombers’: https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2020/05/22/stop-calling-the-us-air-forces-b-52-bomber-old-its-more-youthful-than-a-b-2-stealth-bomber/#200a9d7cbac1

26/05/2020: Would China defeat the USA: https://www.strategypage.com/on_point/20200520115432.aspx

26/05/2020: Morrisson should cut JCU’s funding. This sort of funding (and fake science) has to stop: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/jcu-appeals-the-peter-ridd-unfair-dismissal-win-today-and-tomorrow/

26/05/2020: Better Seam Sealing: You have probably used Silnett and similar products to DIY seal the seams in your tents, tarps etc. You can mix up this mixture which is also good for increasing the waterproofness of your floors too but both these methods are fairly messy. Or you can buy some PU seam sealing tape which just irons on. Use a piece of baking paper between the tape and the iron so it doesn’t stick to your iron, and be careful not to have the temperature too high (‘Woolens’ is a good setting), be careful and patient and you will get a professional result. The tape weighs .77grams/foot or 2.5 grams per metre. I doubt whether you cold seam seal any lighter than that anyway and this will give a much neater job on a new tarp: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/25/better-seam-sealing/

26/05/2020: Snow Peak Titanium Sierra Cup: Something ultralight to make your cup of java below with. Just 39.5 grams and 322 mls (10.9 fl oz) D 4.8″ H 1.75″ May also make a useful small billy lid eg for something like this. US 19.95 May 2020 on Amazon or SnowPeak : https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/24/snow-peak-titanium-sierra-cup/

25/05/2020: Vale Hazelwood: We have gazed out our window at this lovely power station for the over thirty years we have lived here. Today they brought the chimneys down, emasculating it. It made us very sad. The moment before they fell a cloud passed in front of the chimneys mimicking when the station was in operation; then down came the chimneys one by one:

It used to be so beautiful in the early morning light from our old farm.

I have to agree with this. It was vandalism by the greens: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/05/vandalism-in-victoriastan-as-the-hazelwood-power-station-chimneys-are-blown-up.html

25/05/2020: Empire Day today (but no crackers). Who remembers?

25/05/2020: Quote of the day: ‘Those who talk of governments “following the science,” “acting on the science,” most of whom could not give a coherent account of the science of anything, are like dogs who yap because the other dogs are yapping’ Via Cafe Hayek

25/05/2020: Time our pollies caught up with Mexico’s President who has banned all new ‘renewable’ connections to the grid: ‘These wind turbines mess up the landscape, produce little energy and are owned by private companies that are subsidized for it. One of the typical scams of the neoliberals’. You betcha: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/23/mexican-president-pulls-the-plug-on-renewable-energy-one-of-the-typical-scams-of-the-neoliberals/

25/05/2020: Hard to believe Bob Dylan is 79 today: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OeP4FFr88SQ (At Newport 1964: introduced by Pete Seeger).

24/05/2020: Real Coffee Never Got Lighter: The Montbell 4 gram coffee dripper (US$19 May 2020):

‘Lightweight, packable, portable, washable, economical, and ecological! This convenient coffee filter utilizes a 60 micrometer mesh to let you enjoy the “true” aroma and flavor of your favorite bean in the backcountry: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/24/real-coffee-never-got-lighter/

24/05/2020: There is no Climate Emergency; the problem remains when will the Ice Age return: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/22/there-is-no-climate-emergency-2/ and Oh, what is happening to the measurement of CO2 at Mauna Lau: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/22/the-global-co2-lockdown-problem/

24/05/2020: Lenin said this: ‘The best way to destroy the capitalist system is to debauch the currency’ ie by ‘printing money. You remember Lenin, the communist revolutionary, the man who ‘stole’ the Russian Revolution (from the democrats) and turned Russia into a prison and a bloodbath? That is just what ‘Jobseeker’ et al are – just the delusion that any problem can be solved by printing enough money and throwing it at it, as if we did not have the lessons of the Weimar Republic, Venezuela etc as sobering reminders – but people forget if they ever knew, and advocate for ever new Green New Deals and like madness. We should be glad that the Govt has ‘saved’ $60 billion on a programme which should never have been implemented in the first place (like the lockdown itself!) and that we might all come out of this with our shirts (though I am taciturn about that still): http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/24/the-best-way-to-destroy-the-capitalist-system-is-to-debauch-the-currency/ BTW: JP Morgan are almost certainly ‘on the money’ with this analysis which shows that continuing the lockdown will not do any good at all: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8347635/Lockdowns-failed-alter-course-pandemic-JP-Morgan-study-claims.html

24/05/2020: Wonnangatta Murders (cont): Human remains are being investigated at Moondarra (between Moe and Thomson Dam). If this turns out to be Russell & Carol then ‘Button Man’ is probably not involved but likely someone who knew them – and where they would be – as I said weeks ago. However I also said weeks ago (10/5) that whoever took them from their camp site would likely dump them where they would never be found: https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/missing-persons-squad-combs-bushland-in-victoria-s-high-country-20200523-p54vsi.html

Timeline: ‘March 19: Russell Hill leaves his home in Drouin with plans to visit various campsites along the Dargo River. He is seen by neighbours picking up Carol Clay from her home in Pakenham at 7.30am. Phone tracking shows the pair travelled through Heyfield and Licola to get to Wonnangatta Valley.

March 20: Mr Hill was last heard from via HF radio where he told a friend in the amateur radio community he was at Wonnangatta Station in the Victorian Alps setting up camp before dark.

March 21: Campers find Mr Hill's white Toyota Landcruiser with signs of minor fire damage, and their tent and some belongings torched near the Dry River Creek Track in the Wonnangatta Valley around 2 pm. A search begins.’ NB I got this useful piece of information from the Facebook Police page last night: ‘Their Wonnangatta campsite was located unattended on 21 March, 2020’ Most of the reports said that the car had been found six days later. If it was found when the police say then they were gone and the camp burned within twelve hours of their arriving, so it was clearly never a case of an elderly couple getting lost and this an someone else’s involvement should have been obvious to an astute observer at the very outset.

‘Local cattleman Bruce McCormack, who has assisted in many searches over the years, said the valley they were camping in was up to 1000 acres of "clear country".

"It's sort of a great open area in the middle of the Alpine National Park."

He said around one kilometre away from the campsite, the area turned into dense bushland where you would "never find them". https://9now.nine.com.au/a-current-affair/new-evidence-including-drone-linked-to-victorian-missing-persons-carol-clay-and-russell-hill/4ea2f0a8-07da-4978-8b01-d23abacecf03

Clearly they camped somewhere along the way if Russell was ‘’setting up camp before dark’ on the night of the 20th. Clearly they did not go looking for a drone that night and would not have taken (both) their phones with them if they had. We do not know whether those who found their camp saw smoke or observed smouldering, however the couple were unlikely to have gone for a walk and failed to return during the day as they would have seen the smoke known it was their camp and had it to guide them. The area where they were camped is largely in a huge area of clear country with bush beginning about a kilometer away. They would have been unlikely in the extreme to have gone for a walk in the dark in the bush at night off track or looking for a lost drone. Besides a lady of that age almost invariably carries her mobile phone (which would not work there) in her handbag which would have been left at camp for a short walk as was the phone charger. Someone who was looking for them (and knew the general area they would be in) or someone who was following them or their tracks would have spotted them at a considerable distance in daylight. We can surely add several more layers of improbability to their disappearance being natural considering this additional evidence. For example, both phones taken: 1/5?, went for a walk in daylight and failed to return to burning camp: 1/10+? Or went for a walk at night in distant bush: 1/100,000.

No. They were stalked, murdered and their bodies taken away within hours of their arriving there probably under cover of darkness. Clearly intent and someone who knew they would be there. So many false leads in the reporting of this. It cannot have helped the police and it certainly did not help me understand what was going on. The standard of journalism in Australia is abysmal. BTW: The crime scene was clearly substantially ruined by the time police arrived or they would never have been conducting a search for ‘lost’ people. There ought to have been clear evidence of another vehicle, another person.

PS: Turns out the body was another hapless ‘victim’ from Moe.

23/05/2020: Where is the work ethic in paying people more to stay at home? Jobkeeper’s $1500/fortnight and the doubling of Newstart are bizarre: https://www.zerohedge.com/personal-finance/68-unemployed-us-workers-are-eligible-payments-are-greater-their-lost-earnings Now we ‘discover’ that Treasury is so inept at even counting the public’s money that it can make an ‘error’ of $60 billion dollars in estimates of its total cost: https://www.news.com.au/finance/economy/australian-economy/coronavirus-australia-treasurers-excuse-for-60-billion-jobkeeper-stuff-up/news-story/ce6934584be77830072f4962197e3843 As if $750 per week ($150 in the hand per day) after tax is not a very comfortable living for doing absolutely nothing! Of course many would seek such ‘work’. Mind you, ‘Seriously? Government program costs half of what it was first thought to cost and this is a problem? The last time Labor was in government they were knocking down perfectly good school halls and setting fire to homes.’ http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/22/lets-not-overreact/

23/05/2020: Hanging prevents generational crime such as this. I cannot support the waste of public money in keeping scum like this alive in gaol whilst innocent children die due to lack of funds for medical interventions: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/police-courts/body-cameras-show-moment-brothers-joshua-and-joel-clavell-were-shot-by-police/news-story/b87dd1305a361024a5f7540ccdac45bc

23/05/2020: Wonnagatta Mystery again: ‘What has not been revealed is that Hill was in the area a week before, flying his drone near the Button-Man’s campsite.’ https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/the-button-man-could-be-key-to-mounting-mountain-mystery-20200521-p54v4p.html & https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-rule/oddball-loner-talk-of-victorian-alps-amid-string-of-disappearances/news-story/c44a9ca93b98936a4742e0161892e39a Of course this 'Button Man' is a good enough bushman he wil have made the bodies unfindable (unlike the yokel spotlighters I speculated about). This (and his extreme vigilance and cleverness) may make him well-nigh uncatchable. PS: I also missed this piece of crucial evidence: ‘Police have not found either of their mobile phones’: https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/grandmother-missing-with-man-bought-new-home-days-before-camping-trip-20200422-p54m7y.html NB. When I speculated about spotlighters accidentally shooting them I was thinking they were camped in bushland, but apparently the area is in the middle of a large cleared area so the spotlighters would have had to be particularly inept (not impossible). Surely we do come back down to someone who knew them or a (strong) lone murderer.

22/05/2020: How problematic can the awarding of a posthumous VC be? https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-05-20/teddy-sheean-vc-snub-battle-rages-on-after-reynolds-rebuke/12264248

22/05/2020: I’ve never understood why a bird would want to lose the ability to fly, but this one extinct for 100,000 years is back from extinction. Now that’s something: https://www.esquireme.com/content/46133-an-extinct-bird-just-evolved-itself-back-into-existence

22/05/2020: All that money, all that freedom wasted: ‘Bans played little role in suppressing the virus.

Well, “clear” is not quite the word, because the study contains a graphic which blurs this critical fact.

It plots the cases of infection in Victoria against when the State Government slapped on its bans, making you think the bans suppressed that curve.

But this graphic is highly deceptive. It tracks the infections by the date patients first noticed they were sick. In fact, it should plot those bans against when the patients were actually infected.

The federal Health Department says it can take up to 14 days between being infected and feeling sick, with a median period of five to six days.

When you adjust the graphic for that delay of five or six days, a startlingly different picture emerges.

It shows Victoria’s stage one bans were not imposed until at least a week after the peak of the virus, when daily new infections had already been cut by more than half.

The stage three bans — forcing people to stay home except for essential reasons — weren’t imposed until two weeks after peak infections. By then, new infections in Victoria had already fallen to around just 10 a day.

I’m sure the results would be the same in every state: we were already on top of this virus before the stay-home laws.

We’d already “flattened the curve” by taking the moderate steps of washing our hands, avoiding big crowds, stopping cruise ships, quarantining new arrivals and — most importantly — banning international visitors.

No one was saved by politicians then banning golf, closing beaches or chasing people out of parks. All those bans did was ruin the economy and make people miserable.’ (Andrew Bolt) Mind you Sweden’s ‘solution’ doesn’t seem to be working out all that well either: https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/coronavirus-swedens-death-toll-becomes-worlds-highest-per-capita/news-story/1e9f4fb4fdb0b013e9ea2f10e05aaa7d

21/05/2020: The restorative power of the elk on a million acres of strip-mining: https://www.yesmagazine.org/issue/dirt/2019/04/13/land-recovery-elk-wildlife-habitat-appalachia/

21/05/2020: Is the media winning its propaganda war?

https://yougov.co.uk/topics/international/articles-reports/2020/05/18/international-covid-19-tracker-update-18-may?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=website_article&utm_campaign=covid_article_8&fbclid=IwAR03-PcLBt7_GpwrZJK8MMTXSy2JijWEhTu7fq51GpzT6zuvRbvL9-e5XOo

21/05/2020: Fewer public servants + fewer busybodies = more progress: http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/dithering-is-holding-back-innovation/

20/05/2020: Fun in the Mud

There was an old man who bogged a tractor.

What a quacker he bogged a tractor!

He bogged the tractor trying to rescue the truck.

How’s that for luck to bog a truck?

He bogged the truck trying to save the ute.

What an old coot, he bogged the ute……..

What a story.

To be continued… https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/20/fun-in-the-mud/

20/05/2020: Australian native finger limes: (Della) I bought one of these plants several years ago whilst indulging in a little garden-centre impulse buying. Since then I have sporadically noticed 3 or 4 of the fruit deposited at the base of the shrub during autumn and picked them up as a novelty. Today, however, I discovered that the shrub has become a little more serious about its mission and was able to carefully pick a little bowl full of the fruit.(I say "carefully" because of the vicious spines liberally sprinkled through the branches). They were perfectly ripe, and the jewelled fruit within had a sharp lime flavour. So, what to use them for? Experiment 1: G&T garnish. Result: looked impressive and a great flavour burst, but a tiny bit would have tasted better than the contents of one whole fruit. Undeterred, I used another to dollop some little flavour balls on our salmon patties at dinner time. That was really good: tiny bursts of limey flavour enhanced the fish beautifully. Apparently they only last for a few days once picked but freeze successfully for future use. Will check that out: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/20/australian-native-finger-limes/

20/05/2020: Lord alone knows what the financial cost will end up being, but it will likely be similar to the economic devastation of WW1 or 2 (perhaps both) without any benefit (perhaps not even lives saved): https://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2020/05/peter-hitchens-furlough-billions-just-a-giant-payday-loan-in-your-name.html

20/05/2020: I say this with absolutely no sense of shame: I have disliked Jacinta Ardern from the very beginning. Putting a ‘pretty’ face on the Left does not make them good people or their policies anything but evil. They are never far away from the Gulags or the Killing Fields: https://thebfd.co.nz/2020/05/10/a-piece-of-work/?fbclid=IwAR1EZeBTHKJ2m-rUWPDDQgFp8gxQf_p2jRwxU99KnKsvtbRTvIulD5wbs1w & https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/05/kommissar-of-all-the-kiwis/ Hopefully NZ will ditch her in a couple of months!

20/05/2020: Important thoughts about innovation eg ‘a beaver and a rabbit looking up at the Hoover Dam. “No, I didn’t build it myself,” says the beaver. “But it’s based on an idea of mine.” http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/innovation-can-be-quashed/

19/05/2020: More bangs for your buck! We could sure save a lot on our health care budget – but not as much as the US! (NB Figures are US dollars. NZ’s budget is 79% of ours. I make that a saving of 20% on last year’s budget - A$81.8 billion = A$17.5 billion – remember that when the Govt starts bleating about ‘savings’.

19/05/2020: First Mickey: This mouse reminds us so much of Roman humanity and how much civilisation owes the Ancient World: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58668

19/05/2020:

18/05/2020: Good Heavens, viruses rein down on Earth by the billions-per-square-meter each day: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/16/downward-virus-flux-in-earths-atmosphere-is-over-three-billion-viruses-per-square-meter-per-day/

18/05/2020: Folks who love Vikings (and what red-blooded soul does not?) will be keeping a careful eye on this; the first Viking ship burial excavation in Norway in 100 years: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58646

18/05/2020: Steve Mosher has more evidence the Chinese deliberately created this virus: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/is-coronavirus-man-made-the-bat-virus-it-evolved-from-appears-to-be-faked/ No wonder they are trying to bully us (read: the World) into backing down on plans for an investigation. It looks more and more like this may have been a Xi plan to smash capitalism. Quite successful so far. In Australia we now have ‘More than 7 million…on the dole, pension or other benefit. Another 2 million work for government, and 6 million now get the new JobKeeper subsidy.’ (Bolt) Pretty hard on the remaining 9 million of us!

17/05/2020: Deer Hunter's Tent Goes Bush: I will not confess I broke the lockdown rule against 'camping' and took my Deer Hunter's Tent up the bush for a trial run. It is always possible at my age to have walked so far (and with this trick knee, back etc) that I could not safely make it back to my vehicle before dark: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/17/deer-hunters-tent-goes-bush/

17/05/2020: Some answers to the anti-loggers recent lies about bushfires: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/doomed-planet/2020/05/pulling-the-wood-over-our-eyes/

17/05/2020: I expect there will be a lot of this: Green New Zealand has disappointed activists, by ditching climate idealism in favour of trying to restart their economy: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/16/new-zealand-budget-ditches-climate-change-prioritises-the-economy/

17/05/2020: Wondering whether ‘the second wave’ is a myth? Hokkaido has already had one – worse than the first: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/hokkaidos-second-wave-was-bigger-than-the-first-close-those-borders/ People are too complacent. ‘It can’t happen to me’ is a delusion. Too many people were breaching the rules this weekend – even though I was up the bush by myself I saw breaches of the maximum allowable group size and 1.5 metre protocols… You can also see the second wave starting in Iran: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/second-wave-starting-in-iran/ PS: It is always possible that the second wave is a result of the increase in the number of tests. However:

14/05/2020: Thomson River Packrafting Day Trip: You can have some really wonderful single day packrafting adventures on Gippsland’s wonderful Thomson River. I promised to post this ages ago, but the summer fires and the coronavirus lock-down has meant I have not had the opportunity to go take a look – and I need to take a couple of more looks in the future, so I will be updating this.

Nevertheless yesterday on the first day restrictions were eased took a drive to check out whether they had finished clearing the Mitchell Creek Track. We would have checked out the marble Quarry Track too but they were still working nearby, so we went around to the other side and drove up the Stoney Creek Rd to see whether the T8-10 had been re-opened.

The good news is the Mitchell Creek Track has been cleared pretty much all the way to the river. The last half a kilometre of very steep going is really only suitable for $WDs (probably equipped with a winch – be warned). However you could drive along with a normal SUV as far as the drop-off pictured then walk from there. At the moment there is a deep puddle about 100 metres further back where you should probably stop.

The last 300 metres is suicidally steep.

14/05/2020: Air Pollution has been down everywhere as a result of the lock downs – as you will now from seeing posted photographs of the Himalayas etc, but CO2 levels did not fall, as increasing levels of CO2 are being produced because of the Medieval Warm Period 800 years ago (and the associated incredibly slow warming of the oceans –as the correlation of warming periods with CO2 from ice cores shows). Less than 4% of atmospheric CO2 is man-made. Reducing our output has close to zero effect (even if the percentage of CO2 was ‘a problem’ which it is not), but such reduction only comes at huge economic cost. We should desist in such efforts and straightaway begin building some new coal-fired power stations to make electricity cheaper once again and to enhance our economy: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/13/covid-19-lockdowns-significantly-impacting-global-air-quality/

14/05/2020: Teddy Roosevelt: We will probably not see his like again: https://time.com/5259995/theodore-roosevelt-portrait-conservation-hunting/

14/05/2020: What happens when you seize a tiger by the tail: ‘China deliberately suppressed or destroyed evidence of the coronavirus outbreak in an “assault on international transparency’’ that cost tens of thousands of lives, according to a dossier prepared by concerned Western governments on the COVID-19 contagion.

It states that to the “endangerment of other countries” the Chinese government covered-up news of the virus by silencing or “disappearing” doctors who spoke out, destroying evidence of it in laboratories and refusing to provide live samples to international scientists who were working on a vaccine.’ https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/coronavirus/bombshell-dossier-lays-out-case-against-chinese-bat-virus-program/news-story/55add857058731c9c71c0e96ad17da60

13/05/2020: Much cheaper than the NDIS, but somehow not quite ethical: https://www.timesofisrael.com/80-years-ago-lethal-nazi-t4-center-began-euthanizing-germans-with-disabilities/

13/05/2020: The so-called ‘Pell Papers’ (the unredacted Royal Commission guff) were simply used as a further attempt to smear Pell without a scintilla of evidence when the truth is he has a long history of being a key instigator of reform of the Church’s prior parlous response to sexual abuse: https://www.catholicweekly.com.au/monica-doumit-misplaced-blame-for-horrific-abuse/

13/05/2020: Whoops! Lockdown Fail: What happens if you crossplot the “lockdown” rating of the Lower 48 states and DC with the COVID-19 infection rate? https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/12/lockdown-fail-in-one-easy-graph/

12/05/2020: No Wonder so many people are dying in the UK and USA. They are still letting millions of people fly in and out without any quarantine: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/like-sabotage-the-uk-has-locked-down-its-people-but-still-has-open-borders/ & http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/quarantine-coming-in-three-weeks-uk-advises-infected-people-overseas-to-come-to-uk-pronto/

12/05/2020: Has the Amount of Carbon Dioxide Changed Significantly Since the Beginning of the Twentieth Century? Giles Slocum Monthly Weather Review October 1955: http://docs.lib.noaa.gov/rescue/mwr/083/mwr-083-10-0225.pdf

12/05/2020: Sick to Death Of Renewables? This could be the answer – a 3D printed nuclear reactor. Get yours here: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/11/3d-printed-nuclear-reactor-promises-faster-more-economical-path-to-nuclear-energy/

11/05/2020: Why there are clouds in the sky: ‘Humid air is lighter than dry air under the same temperature and pressure conditions. This is called the vapor buoyancy effect. This study discovered this effect allows cold, humid air to rise, forming clouds and thunderstorms in Earth’s tropics. Meanwhile, warm, dry air sinks in clear skies. Earth’s atmosphere then emits more energy to space than it otherwise would without vapor buoyancy.’ https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/10/cold-air-rises-how-wrong-are-our-global-climate-models/ Interestingly the effect is almost identical quantitatively to the ‘greenhouse effect’ of CO2.

11/05/2020: This is important. Increase your Vitamin D dose. ‘Of 49 patients with mild symptoms of Covid-19 in three hospitals in southern Asian countries, only two had low levels of vitamin D; of 104 patients with critical or severe symptoms, only four did not have low levels of vitamin D. The more severe the symptoms, the more likely a patient was to be not just low but deficient in the vitamin.’ You can safely take 1-4,000 units per day. Probably you should take at least 2,000. We are: http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/vitamin-d-deficiency-and-covid-19/

11/05/2020: Personally I am shocked by this. It is over-reaction by many police officers. They are allowed to give the woman a fine but their level of violence against her is over the top: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwyelZV9fSs&feature=emb_title

10/05/2020: Wonnangatta Mystery Continues: I suspect police will be looking for another Wonnangatta murderer. (You will remember that the original 1912 murders were never solved). Today’s ‘new’ information is that the missing man’s friends say it is most unlikely he would have walked far from his campsite. To me this is crucial: if he had been a hunter, canoeist etc it might have been otherwise. Now we have these ‘probabilities’ which can be multiplied together. Chance of he being far from his campsite: Alone 1/5? In company 1/10? – probably much less. Chance of a fire starting (in the absence of a campfire) in a temporarily deserted campsite (in the late autumn): 1/100? Chance of an experienced bushman becoming lost and never found (1/20?) Chance of two people becoming lost together and not being found (1/100?) Chance of a thorough search of the immediate vicinity turning up no sign at all 1/10? – probably more like 1/100. As I say these chances are cumulative: 1/10 x 1/100 x 1/100 x 1/10 = ie less than 1/1,000,000. Therefore, it is more than 99.99% certain someone else was involved, killed them in the tent, took the bodies away in their ute to be disposed of where they would not be found and set fire to the tent to remove DNA, fingerprints, blood-stains, etc. The person (almost certainly a man – I have seen very few women in there and never alone) was very likely familiar (at least) with the male deceased and certainly with the area – eg knew where he would camp! May not have realised the woman would be with him (his wife claims not to have known, etc), but unlikely. She may have been killed because she would otherwise have been a witness. More likely: the person knew both of them., but also is very familiar with the area and knows to dump the bodies where deer hunters etc are unlikely to find them (eg a Reference Area like Mount McAdam on the way out to Eaglevale. If their bodies were in the search area (after the first week, before the search began) wild dogs would have devoured and torn them to pieces (in the extremely unlikely event they both became lost) and scattered their clothing (relatively easily spotted from drone footage surely?) But they would also still have smelled (to a search party) out to at least 50 metres say. You figure the area searched unsuccessfully on foot in a week in that event. Missing garments collectively: socks, shoes, trousers, underpants, bra, tops, jumpers/coats, hat/s, glasses – say 20 items altogether spread out (by dingoes) over perhaps 2500 square metres - as well as their bones! ie They are not there! Police definitely need to hear from anyone who was in the Wonnangatta at the same time even if they were not involved but perhaps there for illegal purposes (eg spotlight hunting – there is also the possibility one was shot accidentally and the other to remove a witness after all). Remember the guy near Woods Point who was struck and killed by presumably spotlighters a couple of years back. Police should offer an indemnity to such folk, or a reward to anyone who knows someone who was there at that time. There is also a better than 50% chance the person was not there alone – I have been there lots of times. Few people travel there alone as I do, but (if you wonder) I have been home all this time, actually longing to go hunting/hiking in the Woonnangatta, and elsewhere – though I do not relish finding a couple of corpses: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/search-for-missing-campers-on-secret-rendezvous-continues/news-story/a09f612e46c0bc13210515ddc9ba0162

PS: Some other thoughts: I said the perpetrator almost certainly used a ‘ute’ to take the bodies away (or possibly a station wagon) indicating that it was unlikely to have been a tray – as if he were alone it would be practically impossible to load two bodies onto a tray. A station wagon would also be very difficult as it is quite a dead-lift. You could use eg a dual cab ute’s tail-gate to facilitate dragging the bodies up the incline formed when you drop it down onto the tow-bar for example, or propped against a piece of wood maybe. It would require quite a lot of strength. I know I have had to move dead sheep from the paddock, and a person would be a longer more difficult object to move than a sheep. (In the same way people who try to display their ‘hunting prowess’ by posting photos of stags on the backs of their tray vehicles obviously give themselves away as poachers in this way. You cannot drag a dead deer far, nor get it up onto the tray by yourself without throwing the winch rope over an overhanging tree – ie it was obviously shot on the road under the lights. Not much of a trophy!) It is extremely unlikely that a woman or a diminutive man could have done this. Then when ‘he’ was dumping the bodies he would have had to drag them off into the bush. This implies bush that is not too thick for walking more or less upright, and it is really unlikely you would/could drag two bodies more than 50 metres, if even that far. The police drones have not found the bodies where they are not, but they might find them where they are by searching along the (main three) tracks in and out of the Wonnangatta either on foot or using their drones - as the bodies clearly have to be dumped before you return to ‘civilisation’. If they find the bodies there might be some ballistic evidence still if they were shot – though if they were shot (clearly with a hunting round – otherwise the bullets would have passed through them and be found by police metal detectors) surely you would hack the bullets out of them where you dumped them. Either a single perpetrator (some lone, crazed opportunistic killer – so unlikely) is involved or someone who knew at least one of the victims, or spotlighters killed them – in which case there were likely two, as it is difficult to drive and hold a spotlight at the same time, and if you had to stop to take a shot you would have most likely noticed you weren’t shooting a deer! Police should be able to get one of the two spotlighters to dob the other in for a sufficient enticement. If it was someone known to them, then it would most likely be some other paramour of the woman, as the man’s wife is clearly elderly too and unlikely to be able to drag an lift the bodies etc, or someone who deeply resented his having an affair with her in any case. There should be very few suspects and the police ought to have apprehended one by now.

10/05/2020:

10/05/2020: The wave had passed a month ago, why are we still in lock-down? https://www.health.gov.au/resources/daily-number-of-reported-covid-19-cases-in-australia Here are some screen shots comparing eg Australia and Mauritius (Pop 1.25 million) one of the poorest countries, but who employed Hypoxychloroquine particularly after April 15^th. Note how they have had no new cases for a fortnight? Note also how the patients all got better all of a sudden whereas ours (untreated) are still sick.

Why are they letting people die from Covid 19 rather than using this known cure (if taken early): https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/05/many-effects-of-hydroxychloroquine-against-covid-19/ & https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/05/80-patients-staff-members-come-coronavirus-texas-nursing-home-hydroxychloroquine-treatment-saves-1-patient/

09/05/2020: Tyvek Solar Reflector: The wonders of Tyvek once again! This device boosts the electrical output of my solar panels by approximately X+ times (and weighs approx 28 grams). Tyvek reflectivity is just about as good as it gets: 97% eg as compared with white titanium dioxide paint at 95.5% so it is perfectly suitable for this application.

The reflector has approx 6 times the surface area of the panel, so I am hopeful I will get a significant boost. I may not get such a good result out of this prototype because the output of the panel may be amperage limited – so too the batteries I am trying to charge. If I get significant improvement I will be trying a larger version whose solar panel has two outlets, and I will move on from there: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/09/tyvek-solar-reflector/

09/05/2020: No Evidence Against Pell At All of Any Kind, ‘THE first thing to point out about the Get Pell Royal Commission’s redacted “findings” is the risible misnomer: the Commission in fact found nothing – save brass neck – to prove the leftover claims re-heated yesterday’: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/08/an-el-cheapo-consolation-prize-for-the-haters/ Do go to the link for the Searson Case

09/05/2020: Just when you thought the Holocaust was over; Pavers made from Jewish headstones found in Prague: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58564

09/05/2020: The Fine Art of Virtue Signalling, Some Classic examples: https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/05/the_five_worst_types_of_virtuesignaling.html

08/05/2020: Kayleigh McEnany, Trump’s new Press Secretary will run rings around the media and the Dems. Eg Scroll through to the last two minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=86&v=J40RWU4_vJc&feature=emb_title

08/05/2020: Water still flowing on Mars 100,000 years ago. I wonder did those folk migrate to earth as their planet died. Perhaps we should start ‘seeding’ Venusian skies to cool in down and make it more habitable: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/07/mars-noachian-river-system-may-have-flowed-100000-years/

08/05/2020: Apparently Ferguson’s models and predictions were wrong in the first place – and the fact that he has had to resign because he constantly broke his own quarantine kind of underlines that. This is a classic example of how modelers can create economic ruin. We should stop paying attention to them: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/06/brutal-takedown-of-fergusons-model/

08/05/2020: Why it is important to recognize that Ferguson’s models were wrong. Because he got the cost/benefit of life-years saved so terribly wrong we now have a situation where we have paid fourteen times the value of those lives saved – and that is ignoring the quite obvious fact that they could have been saved by utilising the cheap cure that is readily available (ie less than $1 per life saved): https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/05/the-lockdown-strategy-called-to-account/

1. Hydroxychloroquine 200 mg twice a day for 5 days

2. Azithromycin 500 mg once a day for 5 days

3. Zinc sulfate 220 mg once a day for 5 days

07/05/2020:

07/05/2020: The Long-Predicted Death of Communism in China may be coming. Many were hoping this pandemic would spell its demise. We can only hope. However the Chinese economic collapse will hurt Australia badly due to our huge dependence on them: https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/jeff-reynolds/2020/05/04/as-chinas-economy-implodes-trump-ratchets-up-the-pressure-n388003v

07/05/2020: The Magnetic Dynamo: It’s a Good Thing Earth Still Has one: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/05/mars-magnetic-dynamo-new-timeline/

05/05/2020: Bad Captain Cook: As regards my post of 02/05, I now see that SBS has found a ‘Rodney Kelly’ whose ‘grandfather’ swore Cook left a booby-trap of ‘dynamite’ on the beach 97 years before it was even invented! My wife, Della had relatives on the First Fleet (18 years later). Her adult ancestors on the First Fleet were her Great, Great, Great Grandparents with whom she shares 1/64^th of her genetic inheritance (each) with (but surprisingly no family stories have passed down from them). She does not claim any British inheritance as a result of this, nor for that matter as a result of her parents both having been full British citizens! Nor should she. Nor should so-called ‘aborigines’. We all must stand on our own two feet and make our own way in the world, sink or swim. ‘Root hog, or die’ as the saying goes. Trying to live out of other people’s pockets is economically unsustainable and downright undignified. If you really could survive here for 60,000 years (?) on your own resources you jolly well ought to still be able to!

05/05/2020: Coronavirus News: Too many important things for single posts, but if you value your life, do read them all. Interestingly world-wide almost no infections have occurred outdoors.

Vitamin D and Zinc Sulphate to prevent or cure Covid 19: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/04/vitamin-d3-and-the-chinese-virus-coronavirus/ & http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/race-to-cure-covid/

80 Patients and Staff Members Come Down with Coronavirus at Texas Nursing Home – 39 of 39 Saved by Hydroxychloroquine Treatment: https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/05/80-patients-staff-members-come-coronavirus-texas-nursing-home-hydroxychloroquine-treatment-saves-1-patient/

The sudden drop in flu stats shows what ‘saved’ us from Covid (‘7000 in each of January and February, to about 6000 in March and to just, 262 in April’ – how many lives wwll be ‘saved’ by that?: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/business/terry-mccrann/terry-mccrann-were-lucky-it-was-summer-here-when-coronavirus-hit/news-story/c73fb9aa973f1fb0207bdc3cfc5ab6c5

Apparently ventilators weren’t the solution. In fact they made it worse. The problem with this virus is blood clotting: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/the-stroke-virus-covid-causes-hundreds-of-microclots-throughout-the-lungs-and-everywhere-else/

Folks who (think they) are against GE please take note: Genetic Engineering Could Make a COVID-19 Vaccine in Months Rather Than Years: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/genetic-engineering-could-make-a-covid-19-vaccine-in-months-rather-than-years1/

I’ve had pneumonia a number of times so the most surprising thing I find about this is that you can have it without struggling to breathe: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/mysterious-amazingly-low-oxygen-levels-how-pulse-oximeter-gives-the-first-warning-of-coronavirus/

4/05/2020: Can you help explain the female selfie duckface phenomenon? I sure can’t – nor the weird tongue sticking out: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/05/can-you-help-explain-the-female-selfie-duckface-phenomenon.html

4/05/2020: How washed up hippies and panic wrecked the country: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/05/03/how-washed-up-hippies-and-panic-wrecked-the-country/ Let’s see how that played out in Sweden: https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/coronavirus-inside-swedens-unique-and-controversial-approach-to-covid19/news-story/14ba35f9750c1219a83cd8b1b90396d4 I have also been astonished at how some poorer countries fared (better than us) with many fewer resources – but they did get a lot of Hypoxychloroquine from India early – and used it, as the high rate of recovery shows: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/mauritius/

4/05/2020: Despite the Seven Sisters being unable to sell a single drop of oil because of the Covid lockdown CO2 keeps going up – because it is (97%) not man-made. When will this wacky restriction on human progress end? Who does not want an air con and an SUV?: https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/monthly.html

CO2 Hourly and Daily Values for Mauna Loa

03/05/2020: The Creek #1: We have a lovely unnamed creek here at Jeeralang Junction (I like to call it ‘Sawyer’s Gully’ after the original selectors here) which rises high in the forest valley behind and winds through the bottom of our farm. Not long after we came here nearly thirty years ago I hacked a path through the blackberries along the roadside from our front gate down to where the road crosses it. Slowly I gnawed away at the brambles and rubbish till I reached our rear boundary. Each day’s work was a revelation. There has been a lot of clearing, dam maintenance and tree planting since then. Years ago I made a 3 km loop trail through the fern gullies behind our house. Over the years it has been neglected but I recently thought I would use some of the enforced time of the the corona lock-down to re-establish it.: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/05/03/the-creek-1/

03/05/2020: Covid 19: Hydoxychloroquine really is the cure. But don’t wait until it is too late and you are hospitalized. People who have any doubt about it should read the following article ‘Pseudo-Science behind the Assault on Hydroxychloroquine’ (and thank Clive Palmer for providing Australia with over 32 million doses). NB The correct regime is Hydroxychloroquine Plue Azithromycin Plus Zinc (Sulphate): https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/05/02/pseudo-science-behind-the-assault-on-hydroxychloroquine/ Here are the correct dosages: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1pjgHlqI-ZuKOziN3txQsN5zz62v3K043pR3DdhEmcos/edit NB: The Association of American Physicians approve this treatment: https://www.zerohedge.com/political/association-american-physicians-says-trump-touted-drug-has-90-chance-helping-covid-19 PS: Now that we have the cure I think everyone should get back to work. Any hypothetical ‘second wave’ (likely a myth anyway can be dealt with: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/05/that-second-wave-it-remains-a-phantom/

03/05/2020: Stupidity is the one incurable disease: Hiker celebrating end of coronavirus lockdown falls to her death while posing for photo: https://www.foxnews.com/world/hiker-celebrating-end-of-coronavirus-lockdown-falls-to-her-death-while-posing-for-photo?fbclid=IwAR1BpB5K4s5AsTmJfSfqz4HJfOSZVwY6X4fhIXQzDmlq3W0oLF_1bsbqzSg

03/05/2020: 27 Solid Ways to Build Your Wealth - Some pretty solid advice: https://www.kiplinger.com/slideshow/saving/T037-S003-money-smart-ways-to-build-your-wealth/index.html

02/05/2020: The Purpose of Imaginative Fiction: Governrnent sponsors and prize panels seem to have ‘lost the plot’ – to use a metaphor – or is it? ‘ “What’s it about?” is usually the first question we ask when someone recommends a new book, and it’s the wrong question. What is The Old Man and the Sea about? It’s about a man who goes fishing. If you want a somewhat lengthier synopsis, it’s about a man who goes fishing, catches a large fish, then loses it to sharks on the way home. That’s all. Still, it won Hemingway the Nobel Prize for Literature and it remains one of the finest novels of the 20th century. If you set out to read it in order to acquire information or to inform yourself about the social issues of the day, you are wasting the opportunity the story presents... handing prestigious awards to mediocre fiction is of benefit to no-one, irrespective of the author’s identity or the social importance of the themes they write about.’ https://quillette.com/2020/04/27/the-purpose-of-imaginative-fiction/

02/05/2020: Eating meat may improve mental health - and one in three vegetarians are depressed, study claims: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-8270125/Eating-meat-improves-mental-health-study-claims.html?ito=social-twitter_mailonline

02/05/2020: Captain Cook Shot My Grandfather, the true story: https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2020/01/just-another-fabrication/ My mother made me a homosexual. If I give her the wool will she make me one too?

02/05/2020: Biden has an irreparable probem with Tara Reade especially as she dobbed him (twice) back when it happened in 1993 – unlike most of these ‘historic’ sexual offence allegations. Just can’t believe the Left’s (#MeToo) responses (Like Pelosi) to this. Obviously it is OK for lefties to screw whoever with impunity but if a Conservative should have a hint of it (think Kavanagh) s/he should be castigated mercilessly. Well ‘he’ actually – isn’t it? Eg: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_8EjjK_8IiM&feature=emb_title

01/05/2020: Superlight Hunting Pack, 193 Grams: You don’t have to spend a fortune or carry around a tonne of bricks to secure a wonderful hunting/hiking backpack. I recently bought three of these Clever Lees 35 Litre Backpacks from Aliexpress. They cost me around US$14 each (April 2020) about twice what I would have paid had I lived in the US! As you can see from the Specs they weigh a mere 305 grams. I intended to cut one down but then add an extension collar and pad holder. After I cut it down it weighed 184 grams and after I added the 8 litre extension collar it now weighs 193 grams – not too bad for a (approx) 40 litre hiking pack. This will suit Della well and will be fine for me as a hunting day or weekend pack. Well, fine for 3-4 days surely?

01/05/2020: May Day: Time to pause and remember the hundreds of millions butchered and the billions enslaved by communism and socialism…

01/05/2020: Happy Birthday Today to Captain Tom Moore one of the last of ‘The Few’ on his hundredth birthday (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rX3OeuG_coY&feature=emb_title ), and a reminder of this interesting film about aircraft designer R.J. Mitchell who created the Spitfire: https://archive.org/details/TheFirstOfTheFew

01/05/2020: Make really sure you are taking enough Vitamin D: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/05/indonesian-study-low-vitamin-d-patients-ten-times-more-likely-to-die-of-coronavirus/

01/05/2020: Virology research is fraught with danger: That time Aussie Virologists Accidentally Created an Unstoppable Mouse Pathogen: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/28/covid-19-that-time-aussie-virologists-accidentally-created-an-unstoppable-mouse-pathogen/

30/04/2020: Do You Need a Bug Net or a Tent Floor: If you have been following this blog and particularly my DIY tent/shelters etc you will realise I don’t think you do. I have slept under the stars collectively for several years of my life – more than enough for a dozens of ‘through-hikes’ which are things I would probably never do, as I dislike tracks and crowds. https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/04/30/do-you-need-a-bug-net-or-a-tent-floor/

30/04/2020: Matt Ridley, ‘Yet creationism in government shows no sign of fading. To this day, despite the resurgence of liberal values that came after the Second World War, and especially after the Cold War, the knee-jerk assumption on the part of much of the intelligentsia is still based on planning rather than evolutionary unfolding. Though politicians are regarded as scum, government as a machine is held to be almost infallible’.

30/04/2020: Maybe you don’t remember the first ‘oil shock’ and the consequence theory of global shortages…but such shortages have been proven to be utterly nonsensical. The availability of 50 basic resources has increased by 700% since 1980! http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/29/contra-michael-moore-the-simon-human-abundance-index/

30/04/2020: Perhaps we have all had Covid 19 after all: https://spectator.org/mapping-the-mortality-maze-how-deadly-is-covid-19/

29/04/2020: Ultralight Ultracheap Rain Fly: Can’t make your own? How about this one? 310 grams US$30.25. You couldn’t make it for this. Of course you can’t use it as a hammock tarp as well like mine but it is the beginning of a good cheap hiking kit. You can pair it with a bathtub floor and mosquito net set-up very cheaply too, but I think you can get by with a 50 gram space blanket for a groundsheet, and they cost around $2 each (on eBay etc). https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/04/26/ultralight-ultracheap-rain-fly/

29/04/2020: 250 Years (Tomorrow) since Captain Cook landed at Botany Bay. 50 years ago (in 1970) even the Queen was here to celebrate this momentous event in Australia’s history; one of the greatest journeys of discovery of all time, and probably the most awesome feat of navigation and cool-headedness – yet this year, nothing. How shameful is that? The rewriters of our history have had an awful impact: https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2018/06/enlightenment-virtues-australias-origins/ & https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2020/01/just-another-fabrication/

29/04/2020: Not long now…New Zealand says it has stopped community transmission of Covid-19, effectively eliminating the virus. ‘Central to New Zealand’s approach is a scientific fact that most Western leaders appear to have ignored, according to Michael Baker, a professor at the University of Otago’s Department of Public Health in Wellington who sits on the government’s COVID-19 Technical Advisory Group. That is that the virus usually has a mean incubation period of five to six days, twice as long as influenza, and could be as many as 14 days. “That means that when someone gets sick, if you isolate them quickly and round up their contacts, you can quarantine those people and interrupt that chain of transmission,” Professor Baker said. “With influenza you can’t really do that because by the time you’ve found their contacts it’s too late, they’ve infected other people.”’ http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/new-zealand-win-community-spread-of-coronavirus-eliminated-lockdown-eases-a-bit-tonight/

29/04/2020: Because of coronavirus there will be a halt to immigration. Thank goodness for that: 5 million more people over the last 15 years: Nearly ¾ of that under Labor. 1 in 5 people living here now is a new arrival during that period. Far too many are sponging off taxpayers. They have driven up house prices to levels that Australians cannot afford to buy a home. Our roads, schools and hospitals are overcrowded near to bursting. Huge chunks of these folk have no loyalty to Australia, or are openly opposed and hostile to everything we stand for. We must turn the tap off on immigration now, before we lose our country. A return to Labor will also, always spell a return to mass immigration (of unsuitable people). Of course, as folks have oft observed, ‘Liberals want immigrants to work but not vote, and Labor want immigrants to vote but not work.’

28/04/2020: Cheap Ultralight Bathtub Floor: I was thinking of making one of these for my new Deer Hunter’s Tent but at US$27 and a quite reasonable weight of 180 grams single ( 31 1/2″ x 7′ ie 80 x 210 cm) or 227 grams double (7′ x 4′ ie 210 x 120 cm) I might not bother. https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/04/26/cheap-ultralight-bathtub-floor/

28/04/2020: Can this be true – Dutch invade Germany? https://www.climategate.nl/2020/04/breaking-news-nederlandse-leger-valt-duitsland-binnen/#

28/04/2020: Spending reform before tax reform – more urgent than ever. Do we rally want to be a nation with 240,000 public servants costing $22 billion dollars (nearly $100,000 each!) while we work hard to get by on a pittance!: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/27/reform-reform-my-kingdom-for-reform/

28/04/2020: CovidSafe: Come on people, download the App. Let’s get this bug eliminated so we can get back on with our lives. We did it yesterday. 10 million today, please. What’s this little bit of ‘freedom’ compared with the protracted loss of freedom that this virus has already visited on us? If we don’t defeat it we may never get our lives back! I for one want to get back to hiking, hunting and long walks in the Fiordland forests.

27/04/2020: Did you know: the second plank of the Communist Manifesto is a ‘heavy progressive or graduated income tax’? As it is now nearly 100 years since this was introduced most places (as an emergency WW1 measure, isn’t it about time we abandoned it along with the rest of the outdated communist nonsense? http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-04-15/100-years-old-still-killing-us-america-was-much-better-income-tax

27/04/2020: Even if you took the Victorian Government’s figures as a fact (ie 36,000 lives saved (Preposterous! Victoria has approximately 1/70th the population of the USA where deaths are currently at 55,000 - therefore roughly 785 lives saved for Victoria!) the cost of lives saved is somewhere between $36 and $300 million dollars per life saved. This is just insane. As I said at the beginning of this epidemic (and I included myself in it) no-one’s life is worth (on average) $100,000 nor could society afford to invest that amount of money trying to ‘save’ them. We will find we have bankrupted ourselves in a completely inappropriate response ot this ‘crisis’. There will be no money left to address future crises: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/26/in-the-hands-of-idiots/ PS: When you consider that the average age of death of people dying of this thing is greater than the 'normal' average age of death, the cost per 'life-year' saved (It cannot be more than 1-2 per person 'saved) is even more ridiculous.

26/04/2020:How to create moon whales: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=20&v=ScBx2EwSuDo&feature=emb_title

26/04/2020:

25/04/2020: Deer Hunter’s Tent #2: A tent that is also a tarp and a hammock shelter. This tent has been evolving in my head for a number of years and I realise that some of you are impatient that you have not been able to buy one or other of its iterations. However your wait might soon be over. Be that as it may here is my latest and I believe best version of it: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/04/25/deer-hunters-tent-2/

25/04/2020: Two reasons I may never visit Machu Picchu:

24/04/2020: Leftie environmentalists cannot be appeased. First they wanted the 'waste' land where we conducted mining, timber harvesting, fishing, grazing, hunting etc for their 'National' & 'Marine" parks so they could waste it further with their wildfires and runaway vermin & weeds. Then they decided that artificially created 'farm' land was also unsuitable for coal seam gas mining, wind farms, hydro projects and ad nauseum & infinitum. Don’t wait around: they will want your house (and your wife, car, chimney, cat, dog, family – anything the vandals can lay their hands on)! Wake up Australia: these people are just economic (& social) wreckers; they are the biggest pest species in the country and urgently need to be eliminated. Please help to do so at the ballot box when you get a chance.

23/04/2020: How did a European woman get herself to New Zealand (to die) over 300 years ago: https://www.nzgeo.com/stories/written-in-blood/?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Post&utm_campaign=Great_reads_written_in_blood&fbclid=IwAR0ecyJgpsDDq2Udz8IfQlN-UBkwD0kCXayUS6z3PvF4kH-ZLwJP5WYpmSg

23/04/2020: Te Araroa: The Longest (NZ) Walk. When the crisis is over you might spend a few months less enjoyably than this: https://www.nzgeo.com/stories/the-longest-walk/

23/04/2020: Recipes for recovery: Less government; not more: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/04/viv-forbes-with-uncommon-common-sense-on-rebuilding-our-economy.html & http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/23/a-covid-19-economic-recovery-program/

22/04/2020: The Loneliness Epidemic: a predictable result of a couple of society’s silliest experiments, the break-downs of marriage and the family: https://www.city-journal.org/decline-of-family-loneliness-epidemic but there is no justification for government filling the gap which ought to have been filled by a spouse or children. Enjoy the fruits of your own bad choices. Suck eggs folks. I do not want to pay.

22/04/2020: Last year there were over 900 influenza linked deaths in Australia. The flu season struck down 310,000 Australians, ‘While 2019 saw the highest number of influenza cases across the country, 2017 still holds the record for the highest number of flu-related deaths, with over 1,100 cases.’ http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/20/frauds-and-conmen/

22/04/2020: The Left’s Michael Moore begins to understand what a disaster ‘renewables’ are: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/21/earthday-epic-michael-moores-new-film-trashes-planet-saving-renewable-energy-full-movie-here/

21/04/2020: The most entertaining way to get some sense of Chinese C19th history: ‘Flashman and the Dragon’. Of course, this is historical fiction but Fraser tried to make it feel realistic. Sir Harry, I feel, was the original James Bond. From Amazon: ‘Lusting after a clergyman’s wife, smuggling opium to Hong Kong, coupling with an Amazonian woman river pirate, groveling before a ruthless warlord, and becoming the sexual plaything of the most beautiful and evil woman in the world, Sir Harry Flashman, the supreme antihero of the Victorian era, is ready to rise to the occasion to matter what depths of dishonor he must plumb. In this uninhibited and uproarious adventure, Flashman is once again at his irascible best’. https://www.amazon.com/Flashman-Dragon-George-MacDonald-Fraser/dp/0452261910 One of the most interesting things I learned from the book (probably the best way to learn C19th history) is that the guy in charge of the Taiping Rebellion was also called Mao (a coincidence?). So he did not invent the butchery; he murdered in a 'proud tradition'. Until WW1 this conflict was the deadliest in all history, killing millions and depopulating whole provinces there.

21/04/2020: It was always the sun, stupid: ‘The implications of increasing Total Solar Irradiance during the global warming of the last two decades of the 20th century are that solar forcing of climate change may be a significantly larger factor than represented in the CMIP5 general circulation climate models.” (Scafetta and Willson 2014)’: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/20/ipcc-politics-and-solar-variability/

21/04/2020: The kind of science we definitely don’t need. The California estimate of infection rates 50 times higher than thought to be the case was a fake (obviously done by climate scientists bored with lockdown!) The ‘evidence’ of people contracting the vurus multiple times also needs to be taken with a grain of salt. This is a problem with testing, not a new evolutionary strategy for diseases. Vaccines against every other sort of disease have worked for a century or more. This one will too, when we get it – later this year probably. Of course older folks like us will be first in line (after medical workers) – because we are more likely to die from the virus. Suck eggs. Then we will be off hiking again in New Zealand (I hope): http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/californian-antibody-test-finds-only-1-5-of-self-selecting-group-in-highest-risk-county-actually-had-coronavirus/

21/04/2020: An C18th .50 calibre air rifle which could punch 30 rounds through a target over 100 yards away: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/04/20/merewether-lewiss-air-rifle/

20/04/2020: Willis is always a good read. Some chloroquine reflections here: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/11/of-quinine-and-chloroquine/ Why can we still not get our hands on this stuff so we can stop worrying about the virus?

20/04/2020: Such Nice People: Earth Day Founder Dies in Prison After Composting Girlfriend: https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/2020/04/earth-day-founder-dies-prison-after-composting-daniel-greenfield/ It’s a pity more Greens cannot finish this way – as they deserve!

20/04/2020: The husband/wife store, a good laugh; stick with it to the end: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=148&v=GTzzBzo_P20&feature=emb_title

19/04/2020: Vale Westie, a Real Fiordland Legend: You have probably seen my posts about Westies Hut and about that section of the South Coast Track. We have stayed in the remarkable hut in a sea cave at Price’s harbour – and hope to do so again, next time for a slightly longer period, despite the sandflies. I doubt we will be staying for 8 years though, as Owen West its eponymous ‘creator’ who has recently died did. Though the hut was begun by Southland fisherman ‘Slack’ Dawson much of the final construction was done by Westie and more recently much work has been done by Cliff and Ann McDermott of Invercargill and others.

Once the lockdown ends and we can go to NZ again we will be heading for the South Coast Track again or the Dusky, moose hunting.

Some Westie’s Hut eye candy:

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/04/19/vale-westie-a-real-fiordland-legend/

19/04/2020: Memories of the iron lung: https://www.newsweek.com/how-does-iron-lung-work-polio-survivor-last-us-1083104

19/04/2020: The World Cannot Be Fixed; like the Mississippi ‘It Just keeps Rollin’ Along.’ Tinkering scarce ever works. Still, the most astonishing thing about this whole artificially created virus is what China did (after first making it then ‘accidentally’ releasing it). They locked down Hubei Province so they didn’t get it, at the same time as deliberately exporting it to the world – and back when this was obvious to me (around Xmas time) our governments kept saying, ‘Oh No, it would be racist (or some other bullshit) to cut off travel to China even though they were clearly intent on exporting a deadly plague. We must not now allow them to benefit further from their perfidy. The ‘Buy Australian’ campaign and calls to restart manufacturing (or self-sufficency as we once called it) are not lunatic ideas. And (as an addendum) we should definitely cancel that completely unaffordable submarine contract before the farce of delivering the first outdated diesel sub from it in 2032 and the last in 2050 bankrupts us and makes us indefensible https://www.davidwarrenonline.com/2020/04/16/the-world-cannot-be-fixed/ Great! This Chicom virus was man-made: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/the-first-synthetic-pandemic-man-who-discovered-hiv-says-coronavirus-is-man-made-ccp-destroyed-the-evidence/

18/04/2020: A Folding Plastic Kayak at around US$300 and 13 kg. Just great if you are short of storage space: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/04/18/tucktek-folding-kayak/

18/04/2020: I have held up better than Johnny Cash. At age 71, (though I could never sing as well).: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=440&v=FqESx05OuCA&feature=emb_title

18/04/2020: Earth Two: Scientists have discovered (at least) one – and it’s only 300 light years away. Time to get moving on that ‘Warp Drive’. All my life I have thought that mankind was on the brink of breaking away from the limitations of a single planet. It may still happen in my lifetime. It certainly will happen in my children’s – if only because death will likely have been banished then too! https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/17/kepler-1649c-earth-size-habitable-zone-planet-hides-in-plain-sight/

18/04/2020: We have nothing to blame but meliorism. ‘Something must be done’ the people cried. Those in government entrusted with protecting us (from ourselves) should have known better than to give in to our childish demands. The mysterious (invisible hand of) market forces could be trusted to provide us with all the wonderful largesses (and freedoms) that we have hitherto enjoyed - but not if a weensy ‘crisis’ should come along, a bad dose of the sniffles. Man flu no less. Then we should exhort governments to throw away all the gains of decades. We will be regretting this for some time. And the meliorists will clamor for more to be done. Oh God! Why can’t people grow up? Be adults and shift for themselves. Long before any government had done anything, while they were still urging that nothing needed to be done yet flooding the country with diseased Chinese refugees from Wuhan, Della and I were protecting ourselves. We withdrew our money from the stock market against the day (mid March) when it would be advisable to start re-investing (at a healthy profit). We had retreated into the protection of our beloved small Jeeralang Junction farm, planted out the veggie garden, made sure we had fuel to run generators, purchased enough meths and Velvet soap, made our own face masks, purchased what drugs we would need (this was back in late January/early February before the government knew what drugs we would need - they still don't. There will be a trial, they say!) and settled down to wait it out. Such epidemics pass. They can’t jump out and grab you if you take adequate precautions. There was nothing the government needed to do. As it turned out pretty much everything it did do was too late or too unnecessary. Now we have an economic mess, and we will have one for a year or two – unless the government does something! Then it will be worse. Roosevelt's new Deal protracted the Great Depression there for at least a further seven years whilst in Australia (where we did nothing) it had passed in a year! Please, let them not do anything this time. The market will sort this out if the government steps back, sacks a lot of public servants (who could never be afforded anyway) and lets wages (and other things ) fall until the correction has done its work – and we are prosperous again!

17/04/2020: I wonder how many (extra) deaths we would have had if we had done nothing except urge people to up their hygiene and their social distancing while it was about? It seems to peak quickly and fall away even in places where this was pretty much all they could do. Some countries (eg Taiwan and South Korea have kept the death toll extremely low without curtailing economic activity). I know down the track people are going to be very angry about the damage to economies. Governments will need to hope that they are also grateful enough about a handful of stranger’s lives saved without being really outraged about the implications to their beliefs in democracy and freedom. As usual Roger Kimball is worth a read: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/04/roger-kimball-coronavirus-new-york/ This Israeli study shows that the virus peak shows exactly the same pattern whether governments do nothing of go full-on; so what was that all about then?: https://townhall.com/columnists/marinamedvin/2020/04/15/israeli-professor-shows-virus-follows-fixed-pattern-n2566915

17/04/2020: Out of the Ice: As the Little Ice Age slowly ends (as it has now been doing for around two centuries – what some chose to call ‘anthropocentric global warming’) interesting artifacts pop up for archaeologists to investigate. Unsurprisingly many are in Northern Europe (like this one) but there remain oodles of Viking artifacts to discover across the top of the Americas, coastal Russia and Siberia: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58379

17/04/2020: Malcolm Turdbull’s memoirs coming out next week are certainly one reason to celebrate book shops being shut. What a vile piece of work he was/is. I doubt even the Labor Party could produce a worse (Oh I forgot: Shorten, Gillard, Albanese…). Why hasn’t he been expelled from the Liberal Party? He seems to have forgotten that he failed to throw his hat in the ring when the spill was called – or why it was called. Apparently it was OK for him to oust Abbott because a handful of opinion polls were poor, but when his own performance was far worse, his position was apparently sacrosanct. Hopefully this is the last we hear of him. I suspect the book will soon be cheaper than toilet paper, so you might look out for a copy if your hoarded supplies are running short during the lockdown!

16/04/2020: The Cold, Hard Truth About Icing Your Injuries: It doesn't help muscles heal—and it might actually do damage: https://www.menshealth.com/fitness/a29710918/icing-sore-muscles/

16/04/2020: ‘Nobody knows what the future holds’. If you ever doubted this axiom, the current world situation ought to have disabused you…but strangely more people than ever are relying on snake-oil salesmen and the like prognosticators. Have a read of the late great Michael Crichton’s take on this wonderful topic: https://www.docdroid.net/4wgVecr/why-speculate-michael-crichton-pdf#page=2

16/04/2020: The WHO are Chicom stooges. (BTW: Chicom – Chinese Communist Party) We would not have the awful (economic and human) mess the world has if they had done their job. Tedros ought to be lynched actually. I mean last week he even re-approved the Chinese wet markets reopening! Trump is right to de-fund them until they mend their ways. Here’s Topher’s take on them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=304&v=2JFS0Q2USfI&feature=emb_title It is very likely after all that Covid 19 came from a Chinese Laboratory. As I have said before they do not sell bats in the wet market in Wuhan – anyway this bat virus came from bats which live 600 miles from there: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/14/did-chicom-19-come-from-a-red-chinese-lab/ Who is behind the suppression of the immense success rates of the various Hyroxylchloroquine treatments (especially those involving zinc as well as the antibiotic)? A case mortality rate lower than .5% in elderly patients sure beats the observed death rate in so many countries of over 10%! https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/14/dr-faucis-own-career-making-medical-research-had-no-clinical-control-group-used-historic-controls-coronavirus/

15/04/2020: How to X-Ray a dinosaur: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58355

15/04/2020: Imagine a private citizen just being able to buy our entire air force. Truth is stranger than fiction: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/04/australian-government-sells-46-fully-armed-fa-18-fighter-jets-to-a-private-citizen-in-the-us.html

15/04/2020: Never Forget: The virus is still out there: Results in from Austria show that reported cases represent about one quarter of total cases there (We may have done much better), but still only a tiny percentage of the population have had it (yet) or been exposed to it. 99% of the population remains vulnerable. The (bad) cold Della and I both had was very unlikely to have been ‘it’. The fact that so far only 6 cases have occurred in the whole of Gippsland (all foreign travelers) bears this out. We don’t want to get it either. The fatality rate looks more like 1%, so ten times worse than seasonal flu, so it will have to be managed carefully for a long while. Strict rules about hygiene practices will need to be in place for such a long time they will become second-nature (the new normal), but still we could never maintain a lockdown until we had vaccinated the entire population (1-2 years) so we will have to slowly let up and deal with the consequences. Even so we face a recession the like of which we have not seen since World War 2. Life will never be the same again! http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/finally-coronavirus-random-tests-show-only-1-infected-herd-immunity-is-tiny/ Although this study seems to contradict the above: https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/04/report-30-50-patients-chicago-tested-covid-19-already-antibodies-system/ Some doubts also about a German study: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/german-15-herd-immunity-study-wasnt-random-and-may-have-tested-for-the-common-cold/ Unsurprisingly the same Health dept honchos, WHO (& etc) who inflicted this thing on the world still have no idea of the case-fatality rate, so that we are no better at being able to judge whether a million people are going to die of it or 100 million. Great! https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/14/what-is-the-chinese-virus-case-fatality-rate-coronavirus/

14/04/2020: The new Deer Hunter's Tent. Just about finished. See post: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/04/11/miniature-whelen-hammock-tent/

14/04/2020: What explains these different coronavirus death rates? On today’s figures (deaths/cases): Italy:19899/156363 = 12.7%; Spain: 17209/166831 = 10.3%; UK: 10612/82160 = 12.9%, France: 14393/132591 = 10.8%; Germany: 3022/127854 = 2.3%; USA: 22115/560433 = 3.9%, Australia: 61/6351 = (<1%) ie .96% ? All the news is about how badly the USA is doing – but how about the UK? Oz is performing brilliantly. Well done Scott! NB World: 114257/1853505 = 6.1%. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

14/04/2020: Lassie Come Home: What a beautiful, poignant movie it is, especially for all of us who love dogs. We watched it again last night (after an absence of decades). Movie makers really have lost the art of telling (such) a good story. Too often today’s drivel has nothing morally uplifting about it. They are almost always a tribute to shallowness, sexual misconduct and violence – as if that was all that was important in life. Nobility and fidelity are such wonderful virtues. How long is it since you saw a film which showcased truly important human (and animal) attributes? You can get it from Pirate Bay safely using Utorrent and a VPN.

14/04/2020: A near-perfect Roman legionary canteen. Such a mundane object but also so little changed in two millennia. So much thought and planning went into its creation. Not suitable for ultralight hiking perhaps: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58325

14/04/2020: 21 million Chinese died of coronavirus – US intelligence officials intercept data. (Had to be more than 3,000 anyway). If this is anything like true governments needed to be hurrying to deal with the problem much earlier. Apart from the deaths the most frightening thing about it is the level of control that cell phone use creates/mandates. I expect in the future it will be revealed how authoritues here too tracked (and hopefully eliminated) the virus using mobile phone data: https://web.archive.org/web/20200406190917/https://n5ti.com/health/1233/

13/04/2020: South Coast Track: Two ‘I wish’(s) this morning in my facebook memories. This one from 2015: ‘The next hiking adventure begins! Heading off today to conquer the South Coast Track of New Zealand for 6 days with only our backpacks and stamina. Stay tuned for pics and reports when we return to civilization. (NB this pic is an old one of Steve and I attempting to conquer the south coast track in Tasmania (same name, different island!) a few years ago; now we are older and wiser, ...will that help??? :) ) The weather forecast is not particularly auspicious, with a reasonable dose of rain expected, but what are raincoats for?! Wish us luck! http://www.doc.govt.nz/…/things-t…/tracks/south-coast-track/’ and this one from 2016: ‘South Coast Track, Fiordland, NZ: Finally finding time to go through the pix. Internet availability being what it is in wilderness areas, I missed the chances to post pix on a daily basis, so I will do a daily selection now we are home to mirror the days on the track.
Day one was totally passive, involving a jet boat ride over the beautiful Lake Hauroko and then helter-skelter down the fast-running Wairaurahiri River to the sea. There we stayed overnight in lovely wilderness accommodation and prepared our packs for the big walk ahead.’ Catch up with them here: South Coast Track, Fiordland, NZ: Finally finding time to go through the pix. Internet availability being what it is in wilderness areas, I missed the chances to post pix on a daily basis, so I will do a daily selection now we are home to mirror the days on the track.’ Catch up with them here: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/04/25/south-coast-track-fiordland-nz-dellas-version/

13/04/2020: Wild Dogs in the Wonnangatta: I agree with Andrew Rule that sooner or later the lost campers would have been eaten by wild dogs: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-rule/andrew-rule-missing-high-country-campers-revive-centuryold-tragedy/news-story/22c177ddb2f89cfe558e8e87e621715e I have been hunted by packs of them in there myself – and would never camp in the Victorian mountains without a gun! They were much worse before last year’s fires which seemed to have thinned them down a but. I expect to encounter several packs of them in there every trip, like this one back in 2013 with my old dog Tiny: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2013/09/29/hunting-the-wonnangatta-moroka/ More about Tiny here: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/02/23/a-tiny-life/ For many weeks this was my most popular post. People love dogs. I know I do. But not wild dogs.

13/04/2020: Self-pity ought not lead to victimhood and dependence on public charity. It is one thing to bemoan, ‘Pauvre moi!’ and quite another to expect society/others to do something about it. The best solution is, ‘Can do’, the motto of the US marines. To ‘Carpe Diem’. Seize the day. To take yourself firmly by your own bootlaces and pull yourself up. This obscene government largesse we see all around us will lead to exactly the opposite. First it will cause a protracted recession (or worse) and to calls for the government to do even more. Do you recall when the Weimar Republic printed so much money that you had to take a wheelbarrow full of the stuff to purchase a loaf of bread – and folks had to be paid several times a day so quickly was the value of money falling? Pleas for government assistance are always heading us straight for such dire outcomes, because it is all a fantasy. The government does not create any wealth (though it may print money). At its best it may redistribute some of the wealth that others create to the lame the halt and the indigent, but in so doing it always devalues the wealth that others created and deprives everyone of necessary precursor freedoms. At the moment I am spending quite a large part of every day trying to ‘catch a falling knife’ on the stock market as we try to rescue our life savings from the inexorable pit of inflation which the government has unleashed upon us with all this fiat money. I have never before experienced such swings. The value of many shares can and does vary during the course of the day by more than +10% to -10%. Sometimes 20%. If you have scrimped and saved all your life (most of it in farming) to in the end have to entrust your savings to shares in our greatest enterprises it is terrifying to see their values being gambled up and down in such a reckless fashion. Of course one has to have everything set to conditional buys and sells lest in the twinkling of an eye you lose everything you have worked and saved a lifetime to gain – and be thrust in the evening of our lives to some beggarly state dependent on government charity. It is a very tense time. The young who have never experienced want, and who are unfamiliar with the notion that you have to work hard or create your own value will find themselves in difficult economic circumstances. Many will be unemployed for a protracted period. Many others have long since used the cheap money that government has already created to indebt themselves obscenely yet will see the value of their properties crash to a fraction of what they owe. Many will become angry and cast around everywhere for someone to blame and for ever more fantastical solutions. These are dire times. The virus is the least of our problems. It should probably have been left to continue its course without engendering this wholesale economic destruction. https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/04/when-panic-is-mistaken-for-policy/ & https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/04/well-pay-in-pain-when-the-bill-comes-due/ I did not come to these conclusions overnight. Here’s what I said about this issue back in 2017: ‘‘Any means-tested welfare payment provides an incentive to be poor’. Nick Cater. Just repeat this over and over to yourself until you get it:. Our Governments waste most of our money. Mostly they waste it on bludgers whom we would not give the time of day to, let alone a helping hand. A helping boot up the arse, maybe! And they throw the money at these wastrels without expecting a sou in return! Wickedly poor investment strategy. Disastrous moral policy. Government should be about ensuring that people become their best selves, not reinforce folks in being their worst selves. If you keep on rewarding bad behaviour, which is what almost all ‘welfare’ is, you will be repaid with plenty more of it. Apart from our money being thrown away on welfare per se (35% of the Budget!), most of the remainder also goes to ‘service’ these same folks; other big ticket items include: Public transport (2%), Justice (?%), Education (8%), Health (16%), the Public Service (6%), public Media ($2 billion!), Recreation (seriously, 1%) Housing 2% Interest 5% (and rising!) Some of these items are even more (mis) represented in State Government Budgets (particularly, Justice, Education, Public Transport. Less than 5% is spent on Defence or other worthwhile projects. Over two thirds is spent on welfare with no meaningful return, not even gratitude. This is charity gone mad! We need to decrease spending and taxes!’

12/04/2020: Trump’s Miracle Drug: French Study of 1,000+ Patients Including Seniors See 98% Success Rate with Hydroxychloroquine-Azithromycin Regimen. Let’s buy/make lots of them, then get back to work! https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/04/trumps-miracle-drug-french-study-1000-patients-including-seniors-see-98-success-rate-hydroxychloroquine-azithromycin-regimen/

12/04/2020: I am spending my Easter lock down making a new Whelen tent. Stay tuned here: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/04/11/miniature-whelen-hammock-tent/

12/04/2020: Remember this: in 1920 polio stalked the streets of New York and elsewhere (killing 6,000 there that year alone, and crippling many more) and year after year for 30-50 years it came back without provoking an economic dislocation however nasty the death toll, the iron lungs and the calipers were. (The calipers incidentally, for those who tragically still need them, are astonishingly still not free in Australia, where so many things are!): https://www.globalcitizen.org/fr/content/polio-new-york-disease-pakistan-afghanistan/

12/04/2020: We have to end the lockdown as soon as practically possible. Living in a socialist police state is not a desirable situation, nor is the coming economic catastrophe likely to be a result of it. The large numbers of (young) people defying/breaking the lockdown make the situation even worse ie all pain, no gain. Bjorn Lomborg: ‘Economists are now suggesting the costs of continued extreme policies could be comparable to Germany in the 1920s or the US in the 1930s, with massive economic costs, a third of the workforce unemployed and a generational loss of opportunities... This middle ground is more like what Sweden has been doing — recommending people to work from home if possible, and asking those who are sick and over 70 to avoid social contacts. But most people still work, children go to school, most of society is still running. This is long-term sustainable. Shutting everything down is not. We need to map a middle course that both saves most lives and avoids a catastrophic recession.’ https://www.forbes.com/sites/bjornlomborg/2020/04/09/save-lives-and-avoid-a-catastrophic-recession/#63c4f0566f92

12/04/2020: The Resurrection Trick. Still a mystery how it was done (mirrors?), but some clarity at least about the historicity of the burial: https://hbu.edu/news-and-events/2016/05/04/craig-evans-resurrection-jesus-light-jewish-burial-p-ractices/ Of course Josephus like all the ‘witnesses’ derives from centuries later. They would be thrown out by any court of law – save in Victoria! Pity we are still missing the contemporary newspaper accounts (let alone film footage) of these significant doings – and Mohamed’s elevation to heaven on a flying donkey, Yafur! Strange doings!

11/04/2020:

11/04/2020: I have come up with a seam which is easier to make than a flat-felled seam when you are making a tarp or tent: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/09/04/hammock-hunting-till-dark/

11/04/2020: Jo has some better quality data (than I have seen) here. Particularly encouraging is the reduction in community transmission (NT looks as if the virus is finished there – none for three days). Australia-wide the number of new cases has been falling such that we may approach zero (some states will) in the next week. The last week shows new cases as: 104, 87, 57, 49, 38, 39, 49. The vast majority (of this small number) is overseas arrivals and people infected by them. Unknown transmission looks like <20% of this small number, so perhaps 10 people nation-wide. Perhaps two in Victoria! In Victoria alone the Health Dept has 1,000 people tracking all known contacts of infected persons, so that tiny number should rapidly disappear. We are going to beat this thing. Now, if only we can get our economy going again. Fortunately much of our export earnings have been (relatively) unaffected so far: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/crushing-the-curve-in-australia-unknown-source-covid-cases-trending-down/

11/04/2020: Vale Dr Fred Singer, perhaps the greatest atmospheric scientist. His intelligence and scientific brilliance will be hard to replace. ‘Singer, who died hours ago at 95, was a Jew who escaped from the Nazis as a child & then helped fight against them as a scientist.’ Singer: ‘I should note that I am somewhat out of step here with my fellow skeptics. Few of them would agree with me that the climate sensitivity (CS) is indeed close to zero…The best empirical data we have show very little influence on global temperatures from rising CO2 levels.’: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/07/ip-award-winning-atmospheric-scientist-dr-fred-singer-dies-pioneering-scientist-the-dean-of-climate-skeptical-scientists/

10/04/2020: A Serious Concern. We are Encouraging Tyrants. What makes you think we will ever get our freedom back? Is this what our veterans fought for in WW2 and elsewhere? We lost 34,000 (mostly young) people fighting WW2 yet we seem unable to part with a single (elderly) life (like mine) today to prevent our hard-won freedoms (and our economy) being thrown away despite the fairly obvious fact that the death toll would likely be less than annual flu (and that I was willing to lay it down in Vietnam etc – It is the same life I am still, albeit reluctantly willing to forego in order that my children do not live in poverty and/or under tyranny). How long can/will this go on? It has already virtually destroyed our economy and our democracy. Parliament has been prorogued for months: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/10/what-makes-you-think-we-will-ever-get-our-freedom-back/ PS: Australia lost 34,000 service personnel during World War II. Total battle casualties were 72,814. Over 31,000 Australian became prisoners-of-war. Of these more than 22,000 were captured by the Japanese; by August 1945 over one third of them had died in the appalling conditions of the prisoner-of-war camps. NB: ‘The public health lobby has just undermined the benefit of the COVID-19 lock down: In China, there have been just over 3300 COVID-19 deaths compared with approximately 1 million each year from tobacco. In Italy, which currently has the highest deaths per million of the population, there have been nearly 14,000 deaths from COVID-19, compared with 93,300 each year from tobacco’ What other tyrannies can be foisted on us under the pretext of saving lives – or of making our lives a senseless bondage? 10 km/h speed limits perhaps? Wearing a crash hat at all times…the possibilities are limited only by the torrid imaginations of incipient tyrants. ‘Today, 9 April, it is 40 days since the “death tally” started on 1 March. The current tally is 50. Using ABS statistics for 2018, the daily death toll for the nation is 434 so in the 40 days around another 17,000 Australians have also died. By comparison the “pandemic” deaths are 0.29% of the monthly average death toll.’ http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/09/guest-post-keep-blowing-those-whistles-to-keep-the-elephants-away/ Is this really why we throw our freedoms and our economy away? There has to be another alternative – and soon! For some insights into the costs and trade-offs of public health measures, try this: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/09/pierre-lemieux-public-health-officials-far-too-often-ignore-the-costs-and-trade-offs-involved-in-policy-decisions/ Unfortunately ‘the Chinese virus is six times more fatal than pre-existing viral pneumonias, including those caused by flu’ https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/09/but-is-it-really-no-worse-than-flu/ Why we need early treatment to prevent its progression to the lungs.

10/04/2020: Especially this year don’t forget to take your Vitamin D. It is the best and cheapest preventative for lung infections: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/perhaps-solve-the-other-pandemic-vitamin-d-deficiency-to-help-beat-coronavirus/ This virus sure is deadly though if it gets to your lungs; only one-third of ventilator patients survive (best to get that hypoxychloroquine etc into you before it gets to your lungs – contrary to current medical advice/practice particularly in the UK where only Panadol can be used!): https://hotair.com/headlines/archives/2020/04/studies-majority-coronavirus-patients-ventilators-go-die/

10/04/2020: What didn’t you ‘get’ about the Pell case? Below some key elements of the High Court’s unanimous ruling:

124. The assumption that a group of choristers, including adults, might have been so preoccupied with making their way to the robing room as to fail to notice the extraordinary sight of the Archbishop of Melbourne dressed “in his full regalia” advancing through the procession and pinning a 13 year old boy to the wall, is a large one. The failure to make any formal report of such an incident, had it occurred, may be another matter.

“A” refers to the choirboy and “B” to his deceased fellow chorister.

57. In this Court, the respondent correctly noted that a number of the claimed improbabilities raise the same point. It remains that acceptance of A’s account of the first incident requires finding that: (i) contrary to the applicant’s practice, he did not stand on the steps of the Cathedral greeting congregants for ten minutes or longer; (ii) contrary to long-standing church practice, the applicant returned unaccompanied to the priests’ sacristy in his ceremonial vestments; (iii) from the time A and B re-entered the Cathedral, to the conclusion of the assaults, an interval of some five to six minutes, no other person entered the priests’ sacristy; and (iv) no persons observed, and took action to stop, two robed choristers leaving the procession and going back into the Cathedral.

58. It suffices to refer to the evidence concerning (i), (ii) and (iii) to demonstrate that, notwithstanding that the jury found A to be a credible and reliable witness, the evidence as a whole was not capable of excluding a reasonable doubt as to the applicant’s guilt.

https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/opinion-post/justice-at-last-george-pell-cleared/ Shamefully Vic Police (and the ABC) have been conducting a witch-hunt against Pell for years which involves a long litany of false allegations such as these: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/andrew-bolt/andrew-bolt-when-will-this-mob-mentality-end-for-george-pell/news-story/9d964eaec27a5dd0ce74fb428da09efa

09/04/2020: Humans have been producing a lot less CO2 over the last couple of months but there is no decline in its atmospheric content. That is because very little of the CO2 is anthropogenic. Only 3%, so that reducing human production will have virtually zero effect. We should quit this 'carbon mitigation' mania forthwith!

09/04/2020: Another Wonnangatta Mystery. I have been there so often - up to half a dozen trips a year for the last nearly twenty years. I know the area well where these two have disappeared. The torched tent is the worst distraction. It may mean nothing, just an odd co-incidence. One hopes there is not another murderer on the loose there (as in 1912 – I always suspected Harry Smith myself, but we are unlikely to ever know). I suspect a sequence of unfortunate accidents this time: a fall perhaps followed by the inability to return to camp, then exposure, but the fire is weird and may indicate foul play I suppose. It is also astonishing that the police search failed to find anything – how far would an elderly couple have travelled on foot from their camp? They could not have canoed from where they were. It is unlikely to be the same murderer as in 1912 in any case. Normally the area would be alive with campers and deer hunters at Easter but it would have been very quiet there over the last month and will remain so. It is the most remote spot in Victoria yet I can usually walk from where they disappeared down to ‘civilisation’ in a very busy 2-3 days. If you were lost and still a smoker – or anyway had matches, you should survive, and following the river out would seem a reasonable choice to become ‘un-lost’. Strangely though people do not behave at all rationally when they are lost, so it is hard to predict where you will find them: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-04-06/search-ends-for-wonnangatta-campers-missing-since-march-20/12123290 Lost person behaviour here: https://profoundjourney.com/13-facts-lost-person-behaviour/ PS: I like that the guy's wife has come out and accused him of being a 'silly bugger' as she thought he was camping alone! Oh, what a tangled web...

09/04/2020: They think this man should be President: Joe Biden, “We cannot let this, we’ve never allowed any crisis from the Civil War straight through to the pandemic of 17, all the way around, 16, we have never, never let our democracy sakes second fiddle, way they, we can both have a democracy and ... correct the public health.” https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/04/he-who-the-dems-would-have-as-president.html

07/04/2020: I told you so: George Pell was innocent all along. Unanimously. Notice that. The worst miscarriage of justice in Australia’s history: https://www.news.com.au/national/courts-law/george-pell-appeal-high-court-judgment-on-cardinals-child-abuse-conviction/news-story/21a927a7117a2d74b39b2fdef40698bc

What you say is nonsense X and I am surprised at you. You know as well as I do that I think people who actually commit the sort of offences he was accused of ought to be executed - but only if they are guilty. All along Pell was clearly innocent of this crime, and of the crimes the other two even more unreliable accusers claim against them. He should never have been charged. It has nothing to do with 'friends in high places'. These people are senior judges. They will give a lengthy account of their reasoning, but one can guess that a lot of what informs the decision is the long-held tradition that a single witness cannot be taken at face-value as against the accused pleading innocence and a whole lot of other collateral evidence. That evidence in fact did more than introduce a reasonable doubt. It made it wholly impossible for Pell (or anyone else) to have committed this offence at the time and place the accuser claimed. He also changed his evidence over a period of time so in fact there were inconsistencies in it indicative of the fact that it was deluded or invented.

There will not be (two) other cases Y. These two accusers have already been dealt with. Their evidence is so poor it would never have made it to prosecution - as I explained in replay to Z below - and itt is shameful that the ABC broadcast it yet again. They have a lot to answer for - vile organisation. All three of these accusers are people of dreadful character with simply awful records of behavior, mental illness, drug addiction, etc. Not the sort of people who anyone should take any notice of at all as against the word of such an outstanding individual as George Pell. I would not be surprised to learn (after his death) that the Church moves to have him made a saint. Certainly his conduct throughout this trial and (voluntary) incarceration was exemplary. I would certainly have taken the option of bail while all these legal deliberations went on, but he chose a higher moral course of action and put himself in a simply awful situation (even being denied communion). This conduct does him enormous credit - as does practically everything I know about his life.

We will have to wait for their reasoning but I imagine for a start it is the matter they decided long ago of unsupported allegations versus the weight of other evidence ie all the other evidence said he did not commit this offence, I am annoyed at all the commentators above who swear he is guilty of this and multiple unstated offences on no evidence at all. He certainly did not commit this offence, the only one he has been charged with. The other two complainants on Four Corners have had their 'evidence' soundly rejected before. One claims Pell showered him in an orphanage he never visited at all. The other complained of offences in a public swimming pool when many other people who were present say nothing of the sort ever happened. The law has found him innocent. It is at best libelous to make unsupported allegations of pedophilia against him.

The High Court have now come out with some preliminary explanations. The reasonable doubt rule was breached in three defined ways; https://www.news.com.au/.../51daaf39a58b6ffd4fb38d9790fb4dc3

So much for the presumption of innocence B. This is why we have separation of powers and the rule of law.

My post (from 2015) might be a help to some of the commentariat above: 'Hot to Disagree: The most convincing form of disagreement is refutation. It’s also the rarest, because it’s the most work. Indeed, the disagreement hierarchy forms a kind of pyramid, in the sense that the higher you go the fewer instances you find. To refute someone you probably have to quote them. You have to find a “smoking gun,” a passage in whatever you disagree with that you feel is mistaken, and then explain why it’s mistaken. If you can’t find an actual quote to disagree with, you may be arguing with a straw man. http://www.paulgraham.com/disagree.html

07/04/2020: Elizabeth II: 1947: ‘I declare before you all that my whole life whether it be long or short shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.’ What a wonderful woman she has been: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/04/hm-the-queen-and-the-royal-family-with-a-reminder-about-the-commonwealth.html

07/04/2020: Time we knew where the drugs came from. I know where the can of baked beans came from (and anti-competitive international trading behaviour is supposedly banned) but where do the drugs come from? China has a strangle-hold on this industry. Like their dominance of 5G this is a national security issue. I also have never been able to see how their clear subsidy of postage is not in breach of international trading rules. I can buy products from China (freight free for less than the cost of a postage stamp in Australia. That is legally impossible: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/those-who-control-the-medicines-control-the-world/

07/04/2020: Some good news for once: Smoking may reduce the likelihood of being hospitalised with coronavirus, claims a study: https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/04/02/study-smokers-less-likely-to-be-hospitalised-with-covid-19/ Too bad I gave it up thirty years ago really.

06/04/2020: New cases halved again yesterday. Just over 50! Keep up the good work people. We can beat this in a week (and get back to normal) if we all do the right thing: https://www.health.gov.au/news/health-alerts/novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov-health-alert/coronavirus-covid-19-current-situation-and-case-numbers PS: That rate (2.5%) represents a doubling every month. Not bad compared to where we were; doubling every 3 days!

06/04/2020: Dummy photobombs/upstages Queen. The BBC obviously added this stupid feature. This sort of nonsense has to stop: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=110&v=wE4Cmr1j0tA&feature=emb_title See it without the add-on here: https://www.dailyexaminer.com.au/news/queens-message-devastated-nation/3989706/ ‘Our’ ABC may have been even worse: they chose not to broadcast the Queen’s speech live!

06/04/2020:

05/04/2020: Leave your shoes outside: I should have mentioned this yesterday or the day before. We have always done this as we live on a farm. Another reason the Japanese (likely) have a much lower toll (apart from masks and better hygiene) is that they have two sets of footwear: inside and outside. When I was young you could be fined a week’s wages for spitting out-of-doors. The TB epidemic was still very real then - and much worse than this one actually – as was polio, and half a dozen other things we don’t fret about any longer. I lived through them all, though I was infected with TB (my uncle died of it), and diphtheria, whooping cough, measles etc, etc. And I was clearly in contact with polio (the next door neighbours were crippled by it), rheumatic fever (my grandmother eventually died of it), scarlet fever – you name it. Some of these diseases make Covid 19 look like a picnic. I was researching Della’s family history once and was going through the death records for Dundee, Scotland. There was a year in the early C19th when a vast swathe of the town died (of scarlet fever), perhaps a third; an even larger cohort of children (half?). I could see immediately who the ‘Pied Piper’ was. Let’s hope I live through the current plague too. To continue, the vile habit of spitting has become commonplace again. You see ‘heroes’ such as footballers doing it on TV - though they must be awfully careful to avoid other ‘sins’ such as homophobia, Islamophobia and what-not. Spitting is not a healthy habit. It is an excellent way of spreading disease – and should properly be outlawed. Certainly, if you don’t leave your street shoes outside you are bringing in lots of nasties your soles have collected off the streets. Dog dirt is probably the least of them. Sanitise your hands after putting your shoes on – and taking them off too. The Japanese have better hygiene. We need to learn from them – fast! Oh, to add to earlier posts, yet another simple DIY face mask pattern here: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/make-your-own-mask-diy-no-sew-2-minute-and-high-quality-sewn-hepa-options/ We are winning: the Aus Govt’s Dept of Health has the number of new cases yesterday at under 100, the first time since 15^th march: https://www.health.gov.au/news/health-alerts/novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov-health-alert/coronavirus-covid-19-current-situation-and-case-numbers

03/04/2020: What is the value of a human life? Dreamers imagine it is infinite but there is only ever a finite quantity of money or what it represents: the sum total of all goods and services etc in a community which has to be shared out in some way amongst all its members. Dividing that total by the total population gives some idea of the absolute maximum that a society can place on an individual’s life. Yes, it is and always has been an economic decision, not a moral one. The Anglo-Saxons tried to codify this in their ‘Salic Law’ with their concept of a ‘wergild’ or man-price that would have to be paid if someone was killed or injured.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weregild I said the other day that Australia cannot afford to destroy the economy trying to save a few lives – even a few tens of thousands. I even opined that my own life was not worth $100,000, though I could afford to spend that amount on ‘saving’ it – if I wanted my children to miss out on their inheritance. So I would not do so. Nor should our society in general. The basic principle of public health (which has been so successful over the last couple of hundred years or so) was based on small sums spent on individuals (think vaccination for example) having great public benefit – not spending large sums on individuals to great public detriment. One of the most important (relevant) advances in public health (everyone thinks clean water and sewerage) was the re-invention of the chimney a few hundred years ago. Until then lung troubles must have been legion. The cold months of Europe necessitated some source of fire whose combustion products just had to find their own way out of your dwelling as best they could whilst the inhabitants coughed ceaselessly. If you think colds and flu are bad just now, spare a thought for our medieval relatives. Curiously the poorest probably fared better than most because they could not afford firewood. They needs must just huddle together in bed for months at a time in order to stay alive. Spare a thought for them when you reluctantly climbed out of bed this chilly morn! PS: ‘The weregild for women relative to that of men of equal rank varied: among the Alamanni it was double the weregild of men, among the Saxons half that of men.’

03/04/2020: I am disgusted with the ABC (have been for years). Its ‘Get George Pell’ vendetta has distorted journalism dreadfully and visited an awful punishment on a man who almost certainly will be exonerated next week. NB. Pell’s (not) new accuser is lying about Pell ever visiting the orphanage where he grew up: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/04/03/a-week-end-at-bernies-expense/

03/04/2020: It is working. Get sewing people. Let everyone wear masks plus cease touching each other, improve airflow and we will have new cases close to zero in a little over a week; we will be able to re-open the economy this month. Look at the Dept of Health’s graph of how new cases have been falling; it peaked a week ago and has dropped (twice) dramatically since then: https://www.health.gov.au/news/health-alerts/novel-coronavirus-2019-ncov-health-alert/coronavirus-covid-19-current-situation-and-case-numbers Della has been making some terrific masks. They are better than anything you can buy. Use her pattern, make a few and pass this on. NB: Wash the mask after each use and dry in the sun. More good news a common sheep drench Ivomectin clears the virus from the body within 48 hours. Most farmers will have a 20 litre drum of the stuff. You would normally give about 15 mls to a 70 kg sheep. It is used as a vermifuge in humans too so the safe dosage is a known. Let’s drench the entire Australian population on a single day next week. This is what we always do with a sheep flock, then put them onto a clean paddock which has not been grazed for a couple or more weeks. The worm burden drops dramatically: https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/coronavirus-australia-ivermectin-antiparasitic-drug-kills-covid19-in-lab/news-story/615c435e56aefc4b704f4fd890bd4c2c Della’s pattern here: https://www.deaconess.com/How-to-make-a-Face-Mask?fbclid=IwAR1fSM2-c1nXHzf9f7dqUKh0NjPg08YPJLoj9Oj3Mo29xtMIg2BERAh7ne4 Some other good advice here: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/04/wear-masks-flush-the-air-microdroplets-suspend-for-hours/ And NB: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/04/italian-health-system-successfully-treating-patients-at-home-with-hydroxychloroquine.html & https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/04/hydroxychloroquine-rated-most-effective-coronavirus-therapy-by-doctors-global-survey.html It also occurs to me that everyone should be using ion generators as they precipitate out particles from the air. The Yanks are always copying me. I have a lot of readership over there: https://www.news.com.au/…/…/35c1fa09374e8383e484511b9d10609a

03/04/2020: Why aren’t the Japanese dying in droves from the plague when they have zero restrictions and haven’t burned their economy? They all wear masks. Much cheaper really. Get sewing now: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/01/do-lockdowns-work/

03/04/2020: I told you so: San Francisco is banning reusable shopping bags to prevent outside germs from entering grocery stores as the coronavirus pandemic affects cities around the country: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/04/02/san-francisco-bans-reusable-bags-in-coronavirus-fight/

02/04/2020: Why do I have to pay for this: a free flight home plus two weeks in a five star hotel when these folks should have come home under their own steam weeks ago. They must ( at very least) be billed the full cost which has to be at least A$3000 each. This is preposterous.

02/04/2020: ‘The national budget must be balanced. The public debt must be reduced; the arrogance of the authorities must be moderated and controlled. Payments to foreign governments must be reduced. If the nation doesn’t want to go bankrupt, people must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance’. Marcus Tullius Cicero He was not wrong then either.

02/04/2020: This is not merely ridiculous; it is evil. We are not allowed to go hiking or hunting alone or with our wife/husband but if we are of the right ‘faith’ we can have a large wedding gathering like this – in these times: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8173931/Coronavirus-wedding-Melbourne-family-allowed-celebrate-despite-restrictions.html?fbclid=IwAR2J1OtRpUfGiZS2M35ob8S000dpdzQj6gHcKxylmypmflATQNEXgXsAY5c

01/04/2020: These overseas ‘Australians’ who failed to come home in any timely manner when the call went out (weeks ago) and now demand rescuing trouble me. I notice most are not what I would normally call Australians. (Call me old-fashioned). They are clearly citizens of another country who somehow gained Australian citizenship (Yes, we need to look into that too) and have some kind of scam that allows them to live in their country of origin no doubt at the Australian taxpayer’s expense. Now they are seeing both an economic and personal safety advantage from ‘renewing’ their Australian citizenship. If they still have dual nationality I would leave them where they have chosen to live. It is clear where their loyalties lie and I doubt Australia will ever benefit from returning them now. Do you remember the 10,000 Lebanese ‘Australians’ Howard ‘rescued’ from the civil war there (all living there on Australian pensions!) on the understanding they would at least repay their air fares. Not a single one ever did. How long should we go on being scammed before we cry, ‘Enough!’ Much of the ‘stimulus’ payments are of a like kind. People are having their ‘welfare’ doubled! For example. What? There are lots of goodies on offer which Della and I could apply for too and no doubt secure – like the bushfire money, and the old age pension. We do not and will not. All our lives we have managed to live within our means and by our own efforts/wits and we are not likely to become mendicants or bludgers now! Yes, we have personally lost a couple of hundred thousand dollars of (notional) capital. Share value mostly; possibly more in real estate – we shall see. If Scott does not totally wreck the economy it will come back. We have the opportunity at the moment to buy into the share market at a huge discount if we are game to take the risk. We are. I bought over a hundred thousand worth last week and am doing the same again this week. We have backed Australian businesses all our lives – and benefited from it. We have no other country, nor would want one. We are not likely to change now. We have given it our lives and it has given us our lives in return. If it should ask for our lives back we would gladly give them. And we have lost a few tens of thousands of dollars this year on sheep sales too. It has happened before when no ‘assistance’ was available, and it will again. Ups and downs are what life is about. We should not rush bleating to the government every time we have a runny nose or a skinned knee. The new bathroom may take a little longer – or that next trip. Well, what next trip anyway? At the moment we would be delighted to be able to take a week hiking in Victoria’s High Country eg Mt Darling: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/03/08/snowy-bluff-mt-darling-wilderness/ - the new tent (under 800 grams) is ready to go, as you have no doubt seen. Indeed I am about to start on another one) But even though we would see no-one and create no risk, it has been banned, so we will abide for now.

01/04/2020: For whatever reason we are not Italy. Australia today: 19 deaths/4514 infected ie (0.4% - all very old and already ill) including 28 critical. I suspect nearly all would have died this year anyway, or would have been better off doing so, or would have wished to! Only <150 new cases yesterday. We need to think about how/when we come out of this for the good of the economy – and everybody. https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/03/this-cant-go-on-much-longer/

31/03/2020: Well, How About That, A new study by Johns Hopkins University found that the novel coronavirus is impacting men and women more than all the other genders combined. "It's incredible - we've found this virus is far more likely to affect biological males and biological females than any other biological gender…Finally, a virus that ignores the demiboys, dragonkin, and those who identify as tater tots," https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/03/study-covid-19-affects-menwomen-more-than-all-other-genders-combined.html

31/03/2020: Extinction Rebellion are only saying what Greens have ben saying for years that we need a drastic reduction in human population, so why not cheer? “Corona is the cure. Humans are the disease” https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/26/british-climate-madness-corona-is-the-cure-humans-are-the-disease/ It was never true. That’s why. Those who think otherwise should join this, The Voluntary Human Extinction Movement: http://www.vhemt.org/

31/03/2020: The Hammer and the Dance: I have posted about this method for dealing with the plague before. It can be controlled instead of us being controlled by it. It is vital for the future of Australia that the bizarre Marxist economic measures being undertaken now cease before they destroy us utterly and that Australia and Australians get back to work as soon as possible (Easter was a good target date), and reject the notion that we can live off printed money. Just the ‘stimulus measures’ enacted so far have destroyed for all time nearly a fifth of everyone’s lifetime savings. Most of the ‘new’ cases today were infected up to a week ago. New cases are down to 7% this morning – which is a doubling of roughly 10 days. Remember the ‘rule of 72’. Within a week, once we have new cases down to a handful a day across Australia, we can perfect social distancing and hygiene without closing our economy – and we must, or we will become another Venezuela: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/we-can-hammer-coronavirus-in-weeks-instead-we-go-to-war-unarmoured/You should also realize this, that even in the worst affected countries (eg Italy), the eventual death toll may actually work out to be less t due to improved hygiene than the ‘normal’ seasonal death toll (due to the reduction in other worse transmissible diseases - think flu) which we have scarcely ever worried about – so that 2020 may turn out to have the lowest death toll on record (at least in advanced countries). You should also note that the high death toll in Italy is largely comporised of people who would have died anyway, but since they died with Covid they are counted as having died from it. Subtract them and the death toll does not look worse than seasonal flu. NB. Saving my life is not worth destroying the economy for. The value of human life is not infinite. It is probably somewhere around A$100,000 at the most. The ‘Rule of 72’ is a handy compound interest ‘ready reckoner’. When you divide 72 by the interest rate it gives you the number of terms needed till the principal doubles. So money invested at 8% for example will double in 9 years, and so on. The reverse is equally true, ie if you take out a loan at 8% you will have paid the Principal in interest alone every 9 years. There is no such thing as ‘free money’. It always comes at a cost. There comes a point where more lifetimes will be stolen/lost by the cost of this printed money than the virus should or would ever take. We are at (or past) that point. The Fauci Study indicates Covid 19 may not have a fatality rate higher than seasonal flu: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2002387 NB. Korea and more especially Taiwan have limited infection and deaths without hurting their economies.

29/03/2020: Instructions for making an ultralight stuff sack: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/03/29/diy-stuff-sacks/

29/03/2020: The problem with ‘stimulus spending’. It is like ‘Trying to Grow a Flower by Watering its Petals Instead of its Roots’: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/03/26/trying-to-grow-a-flower-by-watering-its-petals-instead-of-its-roots/ I for one am distraught at seeing our lifetime savings being burnt through in days ‘ensuring’ that in the future we become mendicants of the State who have never believed overmuch oin the State in our lifetimes. I hope there is still an oppoetunity to ‘catch a falling knife’ as the market crashes ever downward…we rescued much of our capital early in the crisis but we have to put it back in before the value of our savings is utterly destroyed by the stimulus spending. It looks to me that we can get back into the arket now and acquire 36% more shares than we had before.

29/03/2020: Diamond Princess Mysteries We had a perfect petri-dish coronavirus disease (COVID-19) experiment with the cruise ship “Diamond Princess” So I dug around and found an analysis of the situation, with the catchy title of Estimating the infection and case fatality ratio for COVID-19 using age-adjusted data from the outbreak on the Diamond Princess cruise ship: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/16/diamond-princess-mysteries/ & https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/24/the-italian-connection/

29/03/2020: Why you should always listen to the experts. And then do exactly the opposite to what they recommend. ‘Neil Ferguson of Imperial College London is an epidemiologist. Ferguson warned that an uncontrolled spread of the virus could cause as many as 510,000 deaths in Britain and up to 2.2 million deaths in the U.S. Now, Ferguson and the Imperial College London…says the number of deaths in Britain is unlikely to exceed 20,000 And according to this source, more than half of those who die from the virus would likely have died by the end of the year in any case because they were so old and sick. The average number of deaths from the flu in Britain each year is 17,000’. https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2020/03/forecast-of-british-coronavirus-deaths-revised-um-downward.php & Bolt: ‘We must learn from Taiwan - now. It has around our population but has recorded just 235 confirmed cases of coronavirus and two deaths. Even more remarkably, it's done this without closing shops, offices, restaurants and markets. Mat Carney has just returned and describes its remarkable success - and our astonishing slackness’. University Researcher Mat Carney says "life is pretty much the same as it was" before the COVID-19 outbreak three months ago. Watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DkOKe7tkyF4&feature=emb_title But… http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/dire-report-turned-into-fake-news-that-death-projections-have-been-downgraded/, and there is hope as Bill Gates saves the world: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/bill-gates-pandemic-warning-in-2015/

28/03/2020: Such (chilling) incompetence: Taiwan Says It Warned WHO About Coronavirus In December, But Its Warnings Were Ignored: https://dailycaller.com/2020/03/20/who-taiwan-coronavirus-warning/ & Chloroquine Known as Effective Against Coronavirus Since 2005: https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/03/19/chloroquine-known-as-effective-against-coronavirus-since-2005/ & http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/chinese-company-flew-80-tons-of-medical-masks-suits-to-china-in-feb/

28/03/2020: Do you welcome our insect overlords? Countless freedoms and our whole world economy are being thrown away ‘fighting’ this epidemic. Trump might be right that ‘the cure is worse than the complaint’. (Our own retirement savings look at the moment as if this is the case). It is astonishing to me that our government is not throwing Trump’s ‘cure’, hypoxychloroquine plus azithromycin at it to see if it can’t be beaten now instead of destroying the country in a panic which may be completely ineffectual (or unnecessary) anyway. (We shall see whether he was right next week). It was just as astonishing to me that they never implemented far less onerous quarantine measures at an early stage when we had no disease at all here. I have come home from overseas a number of times and had to sign Stat Decs for Biosecurity Australia about any risks I might be bringing in, but when the chips were down they were shown to be straw men: https://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2020/03/peter-hitchens-is-shutting-down-britain-with-unprecedented-curbs-on-ancient-liberties-really-the-bes.html & https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/03/25/delingpole-coronavirus-peter-hitchens-is-right/ & https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/03/26/coronavirus-to-save-the-village-were-destroying-it/

28/03/2020: Italy 9134 deaths/86498 infected = 10.55%. Still rising! And over 10% of deaths (919) occurred in a single day yesterday. Other countries are rapidly catching up. Yet on the same day hundreds of idiots crowded onto St Kilda Beach to infect and be infected. This is serious people. We may have to start really punishing people who won’t self-isolate or maintain quarantine. See how it took off exponentially in NSW a week ago. Bondi. Because of idiots in St Kilda etc it will here too. I sincerely hope Clive Palmer succeeds in his attempt to source 26 million doses of hypoxychloroquine. Hope he gets some azithromycin too. He may yet get to be our next PM.

27/03/2020: My new DIY tent. Something to keep your mind off things. It is the silnylon version of my recent 10 x 10 tarp. It can be used (two ways) as a tent and two ways as a hammock tarp as well - and weighs under 600 grams. It cost me less than $20: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/03/27/silnylon-hammock-tent/

27/03/2020: How South Korea Flattened The Curve Without Shutting Down Its Economy: https://www.dailywire.com/news/analysis-how-south-korea-flattened-the-curve-without-shutting-down-its-economy If Nic Lewis is right most of the economic pain and pandemic efforts are wasted: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/25/covid-19-updated-data-implies-that-uk-modelling-hugely-overestimates-the-expected-death-rates-from-infection/ & Is the coronavirus less fatal than early predictions suggested? https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/03/is_coronavirus_less_fatal_than_early_predictions_suggested.html

27/03/2020: The ‘meeting culture’ is the problem, not the availability of masks, gowns etc. Perhaps half the adults in the country own a sewing machine and can sew well enough to make a simple mask or gown which will be launderable (hospitals still have them for sheets etc). They might not be quite so effective but they will be a lot better than no masks or protective clothing. If the government issues specifications and patterns and a request for volunteers, they will be inundated with masks within a week. Too many people in Australia have got used to the idea that work involves having meetings, whereas meetings are what stops work from being done. We need to change this right now. Just make decisions Scott. It is what we pay you for: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/masks-can-stop-maybe-75-of-influenza-and-you-can-make-them/ Simple instructions for a DIY mask: https://www.facebook.com/Saludcienciayespiritu/posts/3014115445315040 Meanwhile Taiwan is making 10 million masks per day: https://focustaiwan.tw/business/202003090013

27/03/2020: How to kill a virus. Very useful info: http://maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com/archives/34786-Virus-info.html

26/03/2020: I wish. My post from this day in 2014: ‘Expect a break from me: tomorrow I am off for ten days’ hiking in Fiordland. In the unlikely event that I capture a photo of a live moose, I will come back $100,000 richer as there is a prize offered. I HAVE seen one, and have seen much sign over the years: tracks, browse, fewmets…so I am in with a chance. Wish me luck. In any case, be assured I WILL enjoy myself in that vast wilderness.’ See my posts about it here: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/03/05/from-dawn-to-dusky/ It will be a welcome relief even if we can’t be there at thre moment, perhaps ever again.

26/03/2020: I’m glad I don’t have Boeing shares but others will go the same way: https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/bailout-or-bust-boeing-stock-battered-bankruptcy-odds-soar Much of our money is out of the market at the moment (deciding when to buy back in) but you also have to consider how rapidly the value of money falls as governments print more and more if it. Market opening every morning has me on tenterhooks. Supposedly going up this morning; don’t want to be left behind, but is it a ‘bear-trap’?

26/03/2020: Italy has now moved to over 10% fatality. This morning 7503 deaths /74386 infections = 10.08%. And here in Australia –or is it ‘cloud-cuckoo land’ (as Aristophanes coined it?) hairdressers will be allowed to drop their 30 minute limit on intimate contact and groups of 500+ school children are fine, and etc, etc – and you cannot obtain the cure hypoxychloroquinine but (during the period when the majority of deaths will occur) the government is conducting a 4-6 week ‘trial’. Meanwhile in the real world they are clearing people of the virus in 3-5 days with this and the antibiotic azithromycin: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

25/03/2020: Why you should practice ‘social distancing’. It’s lovely to have a few guests around for a good time – but you will want to see them again. So don’t: https://www.news.com.au/national/rush-hour/rush-hour-super-spreader-party-caused-40-fold-infection-spike/live-coverage/10b5084c58b7289489b4f35c1a19dc8b ‘A fully fit 28 year old who ran marathons tells what it was like for him to get Coronavirus. He ended up spending 13 days in ICU. His ongoing liver problems and weakness will take a month or two to get better. His message to young people out at parties or on the beach: ” You might survive, but the old person that didn’t get that ventilator might not…” http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/young-and-fit-brought-down-means-hard-sharp-quarantine-coming-everywhere/ It is just dreadfully awful, you have to avoid it and stop it going to your lungs if you possibly can. A breathing specialist writes, ‘It first struck me how different it was when I saw my first coronavirus patient go bad. I was like, Holy shit, this is not the flu. Watching this relatively young guy, gasping for air, pink frothy secretions coming out of his tube and out of his mouth. The ventilator should have been doing the work of breathing but he was still gasping for air, moving his mouth, moving his body, struggling. We had to restrain him. With all the coronavirus patients, we’ve had to restrain them. They really hyperventilate, really struggle to breathe. When you’re in that mindstate of struggling to breathe and delirious with fever, you don’t know when someone is trying to help you, so you’ll try to rip the breathing tube out because you feel it is choking you, but you are drowning’. 40% die. https://www.propublica.org/article/a-medical-worker-describes--terrifying-lung-failure-from-covid19-even-in-his-young-patients Other important thoughts: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/24/the-italian-connection/

24/03/2020:

24/03/2020: Trump’s Prescription Works: https://twitchy.com/brettt-3136/2020/03/21/journalist-who-called-president-trumps-tweet-ignorant-snake-oil-drivel-gets-schooled-by-actual-doctor/ Let’s use it, get people cleared and certified as ‘recovered’ and man-power them into a ‘ring of steel’ around the vulnerable eg old people’s homes.

Israeli drug company donating (at no cost) 6M doses of malaria drug to US to combat coronavirus: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/israeli-drug-company-donating-6-million-doses-of-malaria-drug-to-us-to-combat-coronavirus To prevent a depression people need to be got back to work as soon as possible: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/03/covid-19-the-blunt-instrument-of-suppression/

23/03/2020: And now for some good news: British Vacuum Cleaner Firm Designs Instant-Fix Medical Ventilator: https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/03/20/responding-to-uk-govt-call-vacuum-firm-designs-simplified-ventilator/

22/03/2020: Will the Coronavirus shut-down reduce anthropogenic CO2 (yes) and reduce total atmospheric CO2 (maybe?) proving that the recent increase in CO2 was man-made? We shall know soon enough. Roy Spencer thinks it will reduce - even though he is a prominent ‘sceptic’ because he doesn’t think the increase is all that bad. He will be monitoring it. PS. I think most of the increase is natural due to warming oceans created by the most recent warming event (the Medieval Warm Period) 800 years ago. I base that view on the established fact that the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere that is man-made has not increased (from about 3%) since the 1950s when we could first measure it (by isotopic analysis) and on the established fact that the(million year) ice core data clearly show that warming events precede rises in C02 by 800 years - BTW practically the only correlation. We shall soon see who is right. Interesting times: https://www.drroyspencer.com/2020/03/is-the-covid-19-economic-downturn-affecting-atmospheric-co2-mauna-loa-data-say-not-yet/

22/03/2020: Are the new rules ‘draconian’. Draco was a C7thBC Athenian ruler who was the first to codify their laws and publish them, a big improvement – and the originator of our ‘rule of law’ society today. Some of his laws were ‘somewhat’ onerous however – death for stealing a cabbage springs to mind. However, if you kill the cabbage thief s/he cannot go on to worse crimes, and it sure ought to convince other potential criminals to rethink and desist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Draco_(lawgiver)

22/03/2020: NB: We have been doing much more then most, eg our per capita testing appears to be second only to South Korea’s: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/03/23/images/ However, enormously more testing is needed especially so we can make best use of all those who have had the virus and recovered to do all the face-to-face work which actually needs to be done – and so prevent vulnerable people from being exposed (think eg cleaners etc in aged care facilities). We need antibody tests as well as tests of active infections. We will also need ‘man-powering’ as used during WW2: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/21/to-save-our-economy-roll-out-antibody-testing-alongside-the-active-virus-testing/

22/03/2020:

22/03/2020: See how China (& Korea Particularly) flattened the curve. Action is better than words and one picture is worth a million words: https://wattsupwiththat.com/daily-coronavirus-covid-19-data-graph-page/

22/03/2020: Executions for crimes against humanity (akin to the Nuremberg trials of concentration camp commandants & etc) are going to be back on the agenda. The ‘Ruby Princess cruise ship captain who lied about having anyone sick, then tipped out 158 (known) sick people into Sydney and immediately took on 2700 more to be infected is a case in point. As is Brendan Murphy our national Health Expert who is responsible for giving the government (bad) advice which it has been (foolishly) following for weeks. Who knows how many will die because of the idiocy of not moving quickly to crush this bloody virus. Look at the toll from Italy this morning: 4825deaths/53578infections = 9%: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/03/coronavirus-cruise-ship-ruby-princess-now-at-anchor-offshore-sydney.html

21/03/2020: Gerry had good advice for such times: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV5_LQArLa0&feature=emb_title

21/03/2020: How to deal with this recession – let’s not make the Keynesian mistakes: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/03/21/classical-economic-policy-and-the-present-recession/

21/03/2020: Hopeful: Summary of Wuhan #Coronavirus Therapies and Potential Cures: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/20/wuhan-coronavirus-therapies-scientific-background/

20/03/2020: Dear Greta,
So you got what you wanted. “System change & Economic Slowdown” is a real thing now. Aeroplanes, industry, jobs, restaurants, recreation, and schools are all shut down. Instead we have fear, poverty, misery, joblessness, economic ruin, and a bleak future. Happy now?

20/03/2020: Keep This in Mind: ‘Stimulus spending is counterproductive, at least it has been in all of the recessions we have had thus far in the modern world. Recessions are caused by a serious mismatch arising between the pattern of production of materials, goods and services and the pattern of demand for them. They are not caused by an overall shortage of demand. That is Keynesian mythology; which, unfortunately, has turned into a factoid alive and thriving in the minds of almost all economists… Pensioners will spend the money and boost the economy. On what, pray tell, will they spend that money? They are being advised to cocoon themselves.’ https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/03/crazy-crazier-and-worst-of-all-keynes-crazy/ & https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/03/how-to-make-things-a-whole-lot-worse/ ‘in 1919, the government took little stimulatory action and adjustment was quick – all the aircraft, tank, rifle and ship fabricators converted rapidly to civilian uses. This was not the case in the Thirties, when a massive readjustment from the easy money policies of the 1920s was followed by fiscal and monetary stimulation which left a stagnant world economy throughout the decade of the Great Depression. The stimulative measures following the economic crisis of 2008 in countries like Australia had similar effects: wasteful debt creation that actually retarded recovery. What most threatens the shift in the transfer of resources is government action geared to stimulating the economy or preserving, even cushioning, the shift in resources to the new demand and supply constellations’.

20/03/2020: Here we go, ‘The Eve Of Destruction’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qfZVu0alU0I&feature=emb_title

20/03/2020: A readily available effective treatment and preventative for coronavirus. This is not a scam…But, good luck with getting a prescription. If you have some in the cupboard because you recently visited a tropical country (or have rheumatism) you are lucky: https://docs.google.com/document/d/e/2PACX-1vTi-g18ftNZUMRAj2SwRPodtscFio7bJ7GdNgbJAGbdfF67WuRJB3ZsidgpidB2eocFHAVjIL-7deJ7/pub We can still destroy this virus before it kills any more people. Here’s how: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/stop-with-the-fatalism-dont-flatten-it-crush-the-curve-on-coronavirus/

19/03/2020: Meanwhile 2: Islamic State advises terrorists not to travel to Europe (to blow themselves up?) because of coronavirus: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/isis-issues-coronavirus-travel-advice-terrorists-should-avoid-europe-5m89dvjjw

19/03/2020: Meanwhile: Hard to tell whether this is a good or bad idea: Extinction Rebellion Considering Public Suicide Events to Raise Climate Awareness: https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/03/15/kamikaze-greenies-extinction-rebellion-plots-suicide-stunt/

19/03/2020: Italy: The situation is now so out of hand that solid figures have disappeared. Nearly 500 people have died in a single day taking the total to approx 3000 dead/35000 infected or a death rate of 8.5%+ with 8% of infections amongst health workers. We are less than three weeks behind Italy. Action has started here but all the ‘distancing’ will do little good if children are allowed to simply join large groups each day and return infected. And just maybe compulsory quarantine of those infected? Good news on quinine derivatives both as a preventative and as an anti-viral treatment. Hydroxychloroquine Sulphate is sold under the brand name Plaquenil: https://www.webmd.com/drugs/2/drug-5482/hydroxychloroquine-oral/details & some others https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20200317/p2a/00m/0na/026000c The Aids drug Kaletra is made here. It has been known to be effective since the early days in Wuhan. Hopefully government has been ramping up supplies. It may save many. NB: How one small Italian town defeated the virus. Heads up Scott: https://www.livescience.com/small-italian-town-cuts-coronavirus-cases-testing.html?fbclid=IwAR2zumoHX6k6vigeFJBgZAuM1fAZU9BGI7lBkDQBVW1bshp-BR8dQutZCCY

18/03/2020: An audit of Australia's Bureau of Meteorology's temperature records reveals shocking inaccuracy enough to account for up to .4C of the supposed increase since 1900. Add to that their deliberate avoidance of the record of a much warmer period (than any other) in the years 1850-1900 and we can see that the whole 'evidence' of global warming is a fraud. These crooks need to be taken to account: http://joannenova.com.au/2012/03/australian-temperature-records-shoddy-inaccurate-unreliable-surprise/#more-20817

18/03/2020: Something to do in Lockdown: Remember Boccaccio's ‘The Decameron’, in which ten young aristocrats flee plague-ridden Florence for the countryside. To pass the time, they tell ten stories each day for ten days—a hundred stories in all. You can read the book here (https://www.gutenberg.org/files/23700/23700-h/23700-h.htm ) or watch Pasolini’s excellent film: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Decameron_(1971_film) Nothing new under the sun!

18/03/2020: Italy’s death toll is still rising 2503/31506 = 7.94%, up from 7.3% yesterday and 6.2% a week ago! They are rapidly approaching the total deaths in China with way less than a third of the cases and one-twentieth of the population! China (with no warning about it) pulled out all stops to deal with this crisis while the rest of the world with more than a month to prepare sat on their hands. Now they reap the whirlwind! Delay = Death: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/delay-death-countries-that-act-fast-reduce-the-fatality-rate-by-10x/ Maybe time to get your chloroquinine which seems to help a lot: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/17/an-effective-treatment-for-coronavirus-covid-19-has-been-found-in-a-common-anti-malarial-drug/ Meanwhile an analysis of the Diamond Princess is very interesting: 83% didn’t catch it - under ideal conditions, and if they did it was nothing to worry about: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/16/diamond-princess-mysteries/

17/03/2020: How to Make a Tent Pole: I made a sub one ounce hand saw for this purpose, but this is even easier than sawing a branch to length: You can cut approx 10″ (25 cm) of 1″ (25mm) poly pipe to join two hiking poles like this. I used standard ‘rural C’ grade poly pipe https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/03/16/how-to-make-a-tent-pole/

17/03/2020: News: Scomo AKA SlowMo.

17/03/2020: The Boy Who Cried Wolf (aka Cassandra) has been ignored one too many times. When the wolf is at the door it is (almost) too late for anything else than drastic action (grab the gun) and/or panic – as we are seeing all over the world. And ‘The worst is yet to come’ (Cassandra) PS: I specially liked the last line, ‘They are spooked by a spaniel when there’s a wolf on the loose.’ http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/coronavirus-is-the-wolf/ Some good news anyway: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/03/city-of-sydney-postpones-climate-crisis-summit-crisis-postponed-for-another-crisis.html

17/03/2020: The wheels of justice might turn slowly but (sometimes) they get there in the end: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/03/3-turkish-men-given-125-years-jail-each-for-killing-of-syrian-refugee-boy-washed-up-on-beach.html

16/03/2020: Lighting a Fire in the Wet #2: It is no trouble to light a fire with a large magnifying glass when the sun is shining in a clear sky, but it is a different matter if the lens is small or if only brief, occasional gleams of sun come through gaps in the clouds. It can be done quite easily, however, by taking into account elementary physics. White or light-coloured surfaces reflect heat, so with a very small lens or under poor conditions it is useless to try to light a piece of paper, a leaf, or dry grass. But black absorbs heat and therein lies the whole secret of success.

This can be demonstrated in a striking way by using a prospector's lens, no larger than a 2-cent piece, or the almost as small eyepiece from .a pocket telescope or pair of binoculars. Wait until the lower rim of the sun is just touching the horizon—the time when least heat is received from it—and then focus the rays on a piece of black tinder made from cotton cloth. Within 2 or 3 seconds the tinder will start to glow. The same thing happens when the sun gleams for a second or two through a gap in driving clouds.

If no tinder is available, use a tiny ball of cotton thread taken from the clothing, or some very fine threads of grass leaf or inner fibrous bark, bone dry and blackened by thorough rubbing between the finger and thumb with a scrap of old, soft charcoal.

Lighting a "fire in wet weather is another art which must be mastered. The worst conditions are those under which so many of our troops lived, ate, slept, fought, and died in the jungles of New Guinea. Through the steamy green gloom of the rain forest the tall columns of the trees rise to a thick ceiling of leaves. Their trunks are festooned with a tangle of lianas and canes. Underfoot is a mat of sodden leaves and all the fallen timber is like a wet and rotten sponge. Only too often, especially in the afternoon, the rain streams down, hour after hour. To get a fire going to cook some food or make tea under these conditions might seem impossible, but it can be done by those who know what to do.

In the rain forests of Queensland there is a tree whose wood burns when green. It is the 'kerosene tree' or ghittoe (Hal-fordia) whose heartwood is filled with minute specks of resin. It is identified by the absence of root buttresses, and by large, yellow-barked roots which twist about on the surface of the surrounding soil. The leaves are small, dark green, and resemble the fruit of a fig tree in outline.

A slab is split off the trunk of a ghittoe—a tough job, for it is one of the hardest timbers in the world and it cannot be done without an axe. Some of the saffron-yellow heartwood must be included. Little splinters of this heartwood are stuck in the ground in a circle with their tops touching, like the framework of an Indian tepee. Larger splinters are added, then pieces of wood the size of a pencil. The match is applied to the fine inner splinters through a gap left for the purpose.

It should be laid in a sheltered spot among the root buttresses of a big tree, as a little puff of wind will extinguish it when first lit. It is also necessary to stick the splinters firmly into the ground, because it will not burn if laid flat in the ordinary way. Although ghittoe wood is the best of them, there are other woods in the rain forests of Queensland, as well as in New Guinea, New Britain, and other tropical countries, which will burn green if the fire is laid in the way described.

They can be identified by asking natives to point them out, or by experimenting with splinters of the heartwood.

Another method in the Queensland rain forests is to look for the blue kauri pine, Agatbis palmerstonii. It can be distinguished from the brown kauri, Agathis robusta, because the trunk of the former is mottled with bluish patches, while the latter is a dull brown. When one of these trees is found, see if it has a broken limb—most kauris have one or two. Stand directly under the end of a broken branch and scrape away the leaves. Lumps of hard, glassy resin which have dripped from the stump will be found; they range in size from a walnut to a football. Even when wet, a chip of this gum will light with a single match and bum with a hot but smoky flame like that of rubber. A few chips will boil a billy of water.

In the rain forests of other tropical countries, members of the pine family of trees will be found which yield inflammable gum in the same way.

In the forests of southern Australia, look for trees such as the jarrah of Western Australia or the stringybark of the south and east of South Australia, Victoria, and New South Wales. Tear off strips of bark and rub the inner layer into bull's wool. Wherever the blackboy, yacca, or grasstree grows, dry kindling can be obtained in wet weather by breaking off the dry, dead leaves which have been sheltered by the overhanging green ones. Porcupine grass (Triodia) burns green.

In very wet weather, little can be done with dead sticks gathered from the ground, as they are usually sodden. Break dead sticks off she-oaks or other casuarinas, from some of the wattles, particularly the blackwood, Acacia melanoxylon, or almost any of the gumtrees. If they are very wet, split them down the centre. The gidgee (Acacia cambagei) of the northwest of New South Wales and western Queensland, or any of the mulgas of the inland, are particularly good in this way.

Fire-lighting under adverse conditions is one of the most important of all things to the bushcraft student.

To bank up a fire in wet weather, so as to have hot coals for the morning, obtain some big banksia cones if possible. These were known as mangait (mahn-gah-eet) to the Aborigines of the south-west of Western Australia. Place some in the centre of the fire, fan until well alight, let them burn for a time, then cover completely with ashes and place a sheet of bark on the top to shield from the rain. In the morning, fan away the ashes and the mangaits will start to glow.

The same thing can be done with the chunky ends of hardwood logs. If gidgee wood is obtainable, it is merely necessary to put one end of a small log in the fire. It will smoulder away through the rest of the night without bursting into flame, burning only on the underside if it is raining heavily.

To carry fire from one spot to another some distance away, it is useless to try to do it with a single stick, unless it is a dry water-root from a gumtree or a stick of gidgee. Use two sticks with the burning ends together, as shown in the sketch. This is the Aboriginal method. It also helps to keep one warm when walking on a bitterly cold day. The sticks should be waved to and fro by swinging the arm while walking, to fan the burning ends. The drawback to it is the way in which the flying sparks burn holes in the clothing.

Carrying fire-sticks

I have seen Aborigines in central Australia with the skin of their upper arms, chests, and abdomens pitted with marks similar to smallpox scars, caused by the burns inflicted by sparks from their pairs of firesticks.

15/03/2020: Backpack Tips and Tricks. Most everyone's backpack is hopeless as well as too heavy. There is a better way: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/03/15/backpack-tips-and-tricks/

15/03/2020: We can change and adapt without ‘Big Brother’. Della and I certainly started our preparations as soon as the news started coming out of China back in January. You can check my earlier posts to see I was ‘neurotic’ about this new virus pretty much before anyone (in power here anyway) was interested. We already lived fairly solitary lives (on a small farm) by choice. We never go to large gatherings. We are not ‘touchy-feely’ people. We have not succumbed to the modern fad of hugging complete strangers, etc. We have always had what people used to call ‘British reserve’. Some of these habits were taught us by our great-grandmothers’ surviving the cholera plague (which also came out of China, as did the ‘Black Death’) in the 1820s. Overcooking food (especially vegies) as all our mothers did came down from such bad cooks being the ones who survived the cholera! Similarly the ‘British reserve’ - even though my family (at least) has been in Australia since convict days. We have been very assiduous about hand-washing and not touching things. Letters and parcels are sat in the sun for hours before we open them after which we wash our hands. We always ‘keep our distance’ from other people. Shopping trips are always only for what is necessary and kept to a minimum in number and duration. I hate shopping anyway. From my web page you must know about my passion for being alone in the wilderness by now. And so on. Yet Della has managed to bring an ordinary cold home (It is: eg runny nose and lots of sneezing as compared with Covid 19) from Milo’s kindergarten (we think) and infected both of us - so our precautions were not stringent enough. I have not had a cold for years. We will need to re-double our efforts if we are to avoid the current (and future) plagues: http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/fight-this-generation-of-pandemics/

15/03/2020: Throwing money at things almost never works and is horribly inefficient: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/03/14/how-to-deal-with-the-coming-downturn-in-ways-that-will-actually-do-some-good/ & https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/03/viv-forbes-on-long-term-economy-building-tax-investment-changes.html

15/03/2020: I think it is a foregone conclusion theat the High Court will free Pell. The question of timing (which unbelievably the prosecution changed at Court) the quite obvious fact that he could not be in two places at once, was never unaccompanied, and could never have got back to the sacristy in sufficient time to commit the offence should convince the Court to conclude that other evidence takes precedence over unsupported teastimony as has ever been their principle. They will want time to write their conclusions in a water-tight way as important questions of law are involved, not least whether Victoria’s new Jury’s Act is invalid in that it is in breach of a person’s right to have a fair trial – it makes it impossible for the judge to advise the jury on key elements of its methodology for reaching a conclusion: https://catholicleader.com.au/news/high-court-reserves-decision-on-the-fate-of-cardinal-george-pell-after-two-day-hearing About that timing: the only possible time the offence was alleged could have occurred was in the ‘quiet time’ of prayer and reflection immediately after Mass when the procession was streaming out of the church and during which time it was Pell’s habit (began on the first day – which this was) of greeting parishioners on the front steps for ten minutes or so. The accompanying priest gave evidence that he never had Pell out of his sight and two adult married women have also sworn that Pell was always in their sight at this time. The boys were alleged to have hurried around to the sacristy, found and drunk some wine and then been accosted. They also had time to put their clothes back on before the sacristan arrived back there with the ceremonial objects (he took 5-6 minutes after the end of the Mass according to several witnesses (including the complainant). However it takes several minutes (up to five) for an adult to walk around the church and arrive at that room (leaving almost no time to do any offending. It is the same five minutes as the five minutes the boys would have taken to get there. No-one ever missed these boys – all the choristers went immediately to another rehearsal where they were also present. Even if Pell broke away the minute the procession exited the main door he waould still not have had time to complete the offences (which took 5-6 minutes too. Indeed one of the High Court judges observed that they could not have taken less than 7-8 minutes). Always though, you have to bear in mind that the 5-6 minute gap is ther same 5-6 minutes., ie the time that the sacristan waited before taking the objects back to the sacristy. The time needed for the boys to get there (2 minutes ahead of Pell, for Pell to have gotten there (also five minutes, for the 7-8 minute offending to have taken place after the five minutes spent getting there. Just on the issue of time (there was never enough) he would have to be acquitted, but as he was always accompanied by another priest (on oath) and seen outside the church for at least ten minutes by other witnesses, then not only is there ‘reasonable doubt’ that he did not offend, it is actually impossible for him to have done so. This is probably the worst miscarriage of justice in Australia’s history.

14/03/2020: Lay Flat Kettle and Pudding Bowl Stove: Some more great ideas from 'Tim the Tinker'. 'Winter is coming' as they say, so it is time to sharpen up your winter tent and tipis designs and complete your experiments in how to heat them effectively: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/03/11/lay-flat-kettle-and-pudding-bowl-stove/

14/03/2020: Jacinta Ardern get it about what you need to do if you are a leader: keep the people safe. Personally I don't like the woman; I generally don't like her commie politics, but on this issue she is spot on. And what a competitive advantage NZ will have if it is the only tourist destination in the world that is 100% safe to visit! Come on Scott. The people have woken up today and emptied every supermarket. Time you woke up too and stopped fiddling while Rome burns: https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/coronavirus-spanish-towns-in-lockdown-as-covid19-hurricane-sweeps-across-the-country/news-story/d3e56e2b7948fb08b3d54c8c74a5d596 PS: Not everyone who dies is very old. Check out this poor woman who died in Bali this week: https://7news.com.au/lifestyle/health-wellbeing/coronavirus-in-bali-tributes-flow-for-53-year-old-uk-woman-who-died-from-covid-19-c-743824

14/03/2020: We needed to shut the door six weeks ago to destroy ths virus before it got a toe-hold, but we certainly need to today – and now we need to lock the country down as well, schools especially – they are the single biggest contribution to its spread. Here’s how: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/dire-italy-just-three-weeks-from-3-patients-to-a-hospital-system-on-brink-of-collapse-12-need-intensive-care/ Without closing the schools Morrison is not going to avoid another Italy – and I bet we don’t really have supplies of anti-virals at all! Kaletra is made here. You might still get a script. Remdesivir is unlikely to be available in any significant quantitities however effective it may be. You could try for Tamiflu and Hydroxychloroquine. You may soon need to try something. Antibiotics and Panadol at least.

14/03/2020: About those sanitary disposable shopping bags: T’he COVID-19 outbreak is giving new meaning to those “sustainable” shopping bags that politicians and environmentalists have been so eager to impose on the public. These reusable tote bags can sustain the COVID-19 and flu viruses—and spread the viruses throughout the store’ Hmm: https://www.city-journal.org/banning-single-use-plastic-bags-covid-19

14/03/2020: Everyone’s a socialist in a pandemic. Worse luck. What is abundantly clear though is how incompetent such socialism has been – especially here in the West where it is so rife. Here are some more insightful thoughts about Marx’s heirs: https://rosebyanyothernameblog.wordpress.com/2020/02/22/the-unsocial-reality-of-socialism/

13/03/2020:

13/03/2020: Why we need to switch to nuclear subs: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/03/submarine-disaster-demands-immediate-response-from-morrison-government-details-here.html

13/03/2020: ‘Most men are needlessly poor all of their lives because they think they must have such a house as their neighbors have.’ Henry David Thoreau, 'Walden - one of my favourite books.

12/03/2020: Joe Biden ‘can’t read out a phone number without getting it wrong’. Trump will annihilate him: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4VH2JjWDnk&feature=emb_title & https://nypost.com/2020/03/04/democrats-should-be-wary-of-backing-joe-biden-and-his-senior-moments-devine/

12/03/2020: There may need to be some changes to the road rules on Easter Island: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58074

12/03/2020: Asteroid Mining is Coming, but there are a few navigational etc hurdles to overcome along the way: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/10/bennus-boulders-shine-as-beacons-for-nasas-osiris-rex/

11/03/2020: The death toll in Italy this morning is 631 out of 10,139 cases or 6.2% around double the world average to date. This is seriously worrying, but still Morrison fiddles and will not slam the gate shut. Probably too late now anyway – The Grand Prix with its tens of thousands of overseas visitors is about to destroy us, and did you see footage of those huge queues of folk in Australia waiting on the streets to be tested - and pedestrians just walking past them breathing in their viruses?

11/03/2020: The Full High Court (all 7 judges) are hearing Pell’s Appeal today. They have already decided on this matter several times ie how evidence should be treated vis a vis unsupported (and in this case dubious) testimony, so they are very likely to support his appeal. Just wait to hear the luvvies shriek when they do. Victoria’s Jury Directions Act may well be struck off: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/03/victorias-jury-directions-act-will-feature-in-the-pell-appeal-and-the-ongoing-shorten-matter.html

11/03/2020: Transgender fascists. This is even worse than toilet roll brawls. People have been trained to forget how to be civilised: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8095107/Thugs-set-smoke-grenades-shadow-Grenfell-Tower-Labour-transgender-rights-row-deepens.html

11/03/2020: Why Dorothea wrote that famous line: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/03/a-history-of-droughts-and-flooding-rains-from-1782-1865-in-australia/

10/03/2020: The Last FreeMan. What an interesting read: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/03/freeman-dysons-war-by-numbers/

10/03/2020: 'Rosie the Riveter' dies at 95: New York woman who first inspired the iconic character while working on a fighter plane assembly line during WWII passes away: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-8079283/Inspiration-iconic-Rosie-Riveter-character-dies-age-95.html

10/03/2020: Rats are people too: All experiments should be conducted on humans first obviously: https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/rats-are-people-too/

09/03/2020: Sea level: 'You can see how the earth in Sweden is still rebounding from being covered with trillions of tons of ice during the most recent glaciation. The land is actually rising faster than the ocean' https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/08/looking-for-acceleration-in-all-the-wrong-places/

09/03/2020: Enchanting tricks you can use weather radar for: https://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2020/03/weather-radar-shows-spring-bird.html

09/03/2020: It's hard to believe just how stupid many 'important' people are. Joe Biden's 'created by the Thing' just about takes the cake: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/03/06/maths-is-hard/

08/03/2020: Where we will be in two weeks, as Morrison fiddles: All of Italy’s regions now infected with coronavirus. Death rate 3.8%. Stay safe folks: https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/03/05/all-of-italys-regions-infected-with-coronavirus/

08/03/2020: Being unable to see the wood for the trees - Australia’s great toilet paper shortage: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/03/07/toilet-paper-shortages-why-is-australia-not-a-net-exporter/

08/03/2020: Less than 2 percent of Harvard faculty are conservative, survey finds. I doubt our own so-called ‘educational’ instsitutions are very different. This is a shocking situation: https://www.campusreform.org/?ID=14469

07/03/2020: Fatherlessness is a huge problem. I find it strange that ‘feminists’ often vote socialist. They want the government to be their husband/father figure when what they seem to advocate is ‘gender equality’ and ‘standing on one’s own feet’. Government turns out to be a wholly inadequate father figure when you really want dad to look after you. Think about the submarine contract, the fact that we only have a two week ‘reserve’ of petroleum – or the idiotic response to the coronavirus crisis, instead of instantly closing the borders and instituting a quarantine. Think of the economic and other benefits of a coronavirus-free Australia. Even with a two-week quarantine as a condition of entry, tourists would be flocking to our safe haven, interstate tourism would be booming. There would be no panic buying of toilet paper, and no old people’s homes full of people dying alone without help – as seems likely: https://www.melaniephillips.com/talk-about-absent-fathers-crime/

07/03/2020: A stupendous photo but not exactly the ‘green hills of earth’ is it: https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/figures/PIA23623_fig1.jpg

07/03/2020: We may face this situation sooner than you think, ‘When cash is available, however, cutting rates significantly into negative territory becomes impossible’: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/03/the-imf-paper-calling-for-negative-interest-rates-and-the-withdrawal-of-cash-as-legal-tender.html

06/03/2020: New Evidence of Fiordland Moose: New Sighting Below: Some time back I was contacted by a young journalist, Charlie Mitchell from Stuff, New Zealand. I helped him out as much as I could from my experiences. Over the last two days I have been thrilled to read and see what he has put together of the continued existence of this wonderful herd. There are other moose hunters out there as well. That is good news.

Les Murrrell’s two bulls in the Seaforth River, 1927.

There have been two authentic DNA confirmations of the NZ moose this century. Only last year (May 2017) I encountered fresh browse and fresh moose scent in the Hauroko Burn.

Eventually someone’s hard work will pay off with authenticated footage of one of these ‘gentle giants’. Of course everyone involved hopes it will be their photos which reveal this strange carry-over from an ancient era lurking in the primeval forests of New Zealand. I will be having another crack at finding them myself if my fitness and finances hold up. I will keep you posted.

Meanwhile you can find Charlie’s two fine articles here:

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/103196185/new-zealands-moose-hunt-a-centurylong-quest-for-a-forests-final-secret

https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/104071821/there-are-signs-moose-still-live-in-nzs-wilderness

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/05/15/cheap-comfy-hiking-pillow/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2014/01/06/exped-ultralight-pillow/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/04/14/ul-pillows/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/05/04/stop-losing-your-pillow/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2017/08/25/diy-super-ultralight-pillow/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/06/10/a-soft-pillow-and-a-warm-bed-under-the-stars/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/09/09/modifyingshortening-hiking-mats/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/02/09/light-lighter-lightest/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/01/28/messing-about-in-boats/

Lots of Other DIY Hiking Ideas

03/03/2020: How the BOM create truth by turning a century long cooling trend for example into a warming trend. These folk will do anything to vindicate their ‘global warming’ religion: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/03/01/warming-marble-bar/

03/03/2020:

02/03/2020: Israel Saves the World – we can only hope so: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/02/congratulations-to-israels-galilee-research-institute-coronavirus-vaccine-maybe-90-days-away.html We Can Survive Coronavirus: https://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2020/02/29/five_reasons_you_dont_need_to_panic_about_the_covid-19_coronavirus.html

02/03/2020: ‘The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimates the cost of climate change is likely to be less than 2 per cent of global GDP by the end of the century. The cost of decarbonising with renewable energy is likely to be 4 per cent of global GDP. As scientist and UK media commentator Matt Ridley says of those numbers: “Why do something that you know will do more harm than good?” Andrew Bolt

02/03/2020: It is interesting that the Department of Sustainability, Parks Victoria etc recommend that you do not feed the animals as they may become dependent and unable to fend for themselves. Departments such as Welfare Services, Aboriginal & Torres Strait Islanders, Immigration etc don't seem to share this view! Who is right, I wonder?

29/02/2020: About (that plague) of cute koalas. We live hard up against the Strzelecki forest outlined in the article. There really are plagues of koalas (wombats, swamp wallabies and foxes) here: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/doomed-planet/2020/02/bushfires-and-koalas-its-not-that-simple/

29/02/2020: Listen: The Sound Of The Hagia Sophia, More Than 500 Years Ago – you can really understand why some folks go to church: https://www.npr.org/2020/02/22/808404928/listen-the-sound-of-the-hagia-sophia-more-than-500-years-ago

29/02/2020: This gal is so preferable to Greta: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/02/27/the-anti-greta-thunberg-debuts-on-fox-news-with-a-message-of-hope-for-young-people/

28/02/2020: Tinder: This is a gem from yesteryear. So much useful survival knowledge is all-but lost: ‘Fire Without Matches: More nonsense has been said and written on the subject of lighting fires without matches than on any other—except, of course, the birth of the kangaroo. How can one tell, by reading what a man has written about it, that he couldn’t make it work if challenged to give a demonstration? Quite easily, and it can be summed up in six words.- ‘The age of miracles is past”.

It would be nothing short of a miracle if a fire could be lit by some of the methods described. This is an example: ‘Sparks struck off the flint by the steel are caught on dry grass or cotton threads and are then blown into flame’. It is incorrect in two ways. The spark comes from the steel, not the flint. It is a speck of metal, heated to incandescence by some of the energy expended in the blow of the steel against a stone even harder than itself.

Further, no matter how many of these sparks are rained on to dry grass, cotton, bark, and similar stuff, they will never ignite it. Apart from gunpowder, never used nowadays in the Army, and highly inflammable vapours such as those from petrol and alcohol, those sparks will ignite nothing except tinder.

When bushcraft training began in the Army, we were faced with the problem of making tinder from a substance which a serviceman would have with him, or could find in the bush. This ruled out the use of chemicals such as saltpetre or chlorate of potash. A round was made of technical schools and the university; old text-books from public library vaults were consulted without success. Tinder-making without chemicals seemed to be a lost art. Then a senior officer, who held an arts and not a science degree, hit upon a simple solution.

‘No use going to orthodox schools and universities,’ he said, smiling. ‘Try a different kind of educational establishment— the jail.’

‘We’ve got the man you want locked up now,” said the jail superintendent. ‘No matter how thoroughly we search him, he can always light a smoke in his cell. Mandrake’s got nothing on him. I’ll get him for you.’

Old Bob was suspicious at first but when told why the information was required he took me out of sight and hearing of the warders and parted with all his secrets. He did more than talk about it; he demonstrated everything as he went along. That old man had been in custody for most of his life, but he did more for the troops than many of those who have never seen the inside of a jail. Thousands of soldiers had reason to bless him when the matches gave out.

If flint is unobtainable, any hard rock will do; quartz, chert, chalcedony, etc. For the striker, carbon steel must be used, such as the back of a knife, a safety razor blade, or a piece of a file. Alloy steels such as a hacksaw blade will not do, neither will soft iron. The only substitute which occurs naturally is iron pyrites, the hard and brassy ore sometimes mistaken for gold by amateur prospectors. Best results in this case are achieved by striking one piece of pyrites against another, but even so the sparks are dull red instead of at white heat and it is often necessary to do a great deal of hammering before the tinder catches.

An airtight, waterproof container is necessary for the tinder. The ordinary boot polish tin is the easiest to obtain, but if cut off from all the resources of civilisation a substitute must be found. Prehistoric man in Europe used a hollow bone fitted with a wooden plug. A member of the A.I.F., cut off by the Japanese advance, used a short length of bamboo fitted with a stopper.

The best tinder is made from a piece of cotton cloth, washed to remove dirt, sweat, and grease, then dried thoroughly. First scour the tin with sand, dry earth, or ashes to remove any traces of polish. Place it on the ground with the lid beside it. Light a small fire, take a piece of the cotton cloth about the size of a handkerchief, place it across a couple of sticks and hold it over the fire, out of contact with the flames. This makes sure that it is dry.

As soon as it starts to scorch, let it take fire. It will flare up. As the last of the flame is dying out, lower it into the tin, pack it down with two sticks and at once put on the lid. When it has cooled, remove the lid and the tinder is revealed as black, fragile flakes. If cotton cloth is not available, substitutes can be found in wild cotton, taken from the ripe pods, thistledown, the silky threads from the fruits of the kapok tree, or the brown fluff from the base of the leaves of the palm-like Macrozamia, but this last-named substance must be first boiled to remove the gum and then dried.

Tease any of these substances into a large ball, light it, and at once pack into the tin and put the lid on, as they burn very rapidly. Another substitute is the large, white, bread-like fungus (punk) found growing on trees, or the pith found inside some species of reeds. Break both into little chips, then heat on a piece of tin held over a fire or on a hot stone. As soon as they are glowing, rake into the tinderbox and put on the lid.

All these forms of tinder ignite at the touch of a spark because the cellulose in them has been reduced to a mass of carbon filaments, through excluding the air at the critical point in the initial combustion.

To light a fire with tinderbox, flint, and steel, have ready what the bushman calls ‘bull’s wool’—dry grass or bark rubbed to fluff, coconut fibre, or anything else of the kind, as well as a heap of kindling sticks. Place the tinder-box on the ground with the lid off, hold the piece of stone between the thumb and finger of the left hand and about 8 centimetres above the tinder. Take the steel between the thumb and forefinger of the right hand and strike a light, quick blow with the edge of the steel across a sharp angle of the stone. Move the steel parallel to the ground; do not strike downward, as this is likely to hit the tin and scatter the contents, with unfortunate results if the ground is wet and the tinder becomes damp.

Flint and steel outfit

A shower of sparks will fly off if the blow is struck in the right way and the tinder will glow where any touch it. Pick out a burning piece of tinder and put the lid on the tin at once, for otherwise the rest of the tinder will burn to ash within half a minute. Put the burning tinder in the middle of a small bunch of bull’s wool, blow on it gently until it takes fire, and poke it under the heap of sticks.

In passing: I first introduced these boot polish tin, piece of quartz, and safety razor blade outfits in Western Australia in 1942. A few months later, in Queensland, I found them in general use, as soldiers had sent samples and instructions home to their families. They definitely helped to overcome the wartime shortage of matches for civilian use. It furnishes a modern example of the spread of knowledge known as culture diffusion to anthropologists’.

From, ‘The Bushman’s Handbook’ by H.A. Lindsay. Harold Lindsay was a survival instructor with the Australian and American troops during World war 2.

PS: I always carry something to help start a fire: a couple of esbits and a scrap of bicycle inner tube and of course I use a metho stove so I always have a bit of that too. You should read the post How to Light a Fire in the Wet.

PPS These lightweight aluminium cans would be excellent for your tinder.

28/02/2020: How likely are you personally to die of coronavirus? Interesting reading. Mind you I suspect the situation might be worse than this and that the true effect on younger people might be being concealed to prevent panic. The outbreak in Iran still looks deadlier than most this morning at 10% fatal - down from 20% yesterday though: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-age-sex-demographics/?fbclid=IwAR1xYnNowtaLtZF6utQm0a6dPMADicUZeyvLUlOp7DharD_ROtUBf8AA7og PS: Scott needs to slam this back door shut now: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/reckless-greed-our-universities-are-driving-coronavirus-to-thailand-and-australia-israel-has-banned-flights-to-thailand-are-we-nextnext/ & http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/02/27/casinovirus-addicted-unis-comp-chinese-students/ PPS: It is not pleasant being in the worst demographic.

28/02/2020: The future of education? 93 Vermont Towns Have No Public Schools, But Great Education: https://fee.org/articles/93-vermont-towns-have-no-public-schools-but-great-education-how-do-they-do-it/

28/02/2020: Ronald Reagan was so quick witted and had a delightful sense of humour: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=31&v=5UowNDaxRqU&feature=emb_title

27/02/2020: If a woman murders her children that’s OK? Really? ‘Nor is there any excuse for the murder of four children by Charmaine McLeod on 27 May 2019 when she deliberately drove her car into a truck, probably causing permanent mental anguish to the truck driver’: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/02/26/there-is-no-excuse-for-murder/

27/02/2020: Creating Truth. The BOM have been at it again and readjusted the temperatures way back in 1924 to prove that our grandparents couldn’t read a simple mercury thermometer suspended in a standardized well-ventilated white box. The 160 day record run of days over 100F for Marble bar has been destroyed by their adjustments. Watch how the GIF shows the change in slope of the graph from a decline in temperature to an increase. These cheats need to be sacked: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/acorn-adjustments-robbed-marble-bar-of-its-legendary-world-record-death-valley-now-longest-hottest-place/ & http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/02/26/more-adjustments-to-our-historical-records-and-fun-with-the-aemo-slider/

27/02/2020: Coronavirus. Today’s tally: 2760 deaths divided by 80,994 cases equals 3.4%. Multiply that by the population of Australia (24 Million) equals 817,836 deaths - or the world (7.7 billion) equals 262 million deaths! The situation is likely worse than that in that we are currently able to treat most of the serious cases (15-20% of cases). A much larger proportion of these people will die as the percentage of people infected increases sharply. We face a threat greater than World Wars 1 & 2 combined but the response is still too much hand sitting! Come on Scott! The New York Post is more optimistic: https://nypost.com/2020/02/24/why-coronavirus-will-only-be-a-bump-in-the-road-for-the-world-economy/

26/02/2020: So far as I can see Bettina Arndt was stating this simple truth: We do not know the cause a of death until it is determined by investigation and a coronial report even though we may think we do (eg the Chamberlain Case). Attempts to silence her or to stymie or second-guess the investigation are just shameful. I am proud to see Pauline standing (well sitting in this case) against this obscene push. She will get my vote again! The only sudden deaths which have ever occurred in Australia whose cause was not determined by a coronial investigation were those at Port Arthur, the investigation being shut down by the government - yet the coroner stated that they did not want him to come to a different conclusion than the mob/press had already come to (even though it was unlikely that Bryant would have been convicted on the evidence presented by police at his trial). To double up on this weird injustice state and federal governments put all the details of the case under a 100 year secrecy block – so they must have something to hide! https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/02/lnp-labor-unite-in-senate-vote-that-bettina-arndts-values-not-consistent-with-her-retaining-order-of.html

26/02/2020: China may well be getting on top of this awful plague, but others (Iran…) are hiding their heads in the sand and it is spreading like wildfire The death rate in Qom (Iran) appears to be 20%! Good thing they have Allah helping out! I liked this quote from Nassem Nicholas Taleb this morning, ‘ When paranoid you can be wrong 1,000 times and you will survive. If non-paranoid, wrong once and you, your genes and the rest of the group are done.’ Sombre. http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/02/25/the-coronavirus-story-and-the-economy-thus-far/ In Iran they do not believe in quarantine! And you can still fly from there to Oz for less than A$800. Oh great: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/iran-has-been-hiding-coronavirus-for-weeks-albania-closes-borders-but-830-still-buys-a-flight-to-melbourne/

26/02/2020: I think I like Bertrand Russell's new Tenth Commandment best, ie "Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness." The other nine are just as fresh today as they were in 1951. What a great mind he was! http://www.panarchy.org/russell/decalogue.1951.html

26/02/2020: What would the cost of ‘net zero’ (2050) be? Over A$200,000 per household! Hold onto your mortgage folks. Albo (and Boris) are going to crush you: https://www.thegwpf.com/cost-of-net-zero-will-be-astronomical-new-reports-warn/

25/02/2020: Pope John Paul 2: ‘Clearly, then, the fundamental problem of youth is profoundly personal. In life, youth is when we come to know ourselves. It is also a time of communion. Young people, whether girls or boys, know they must live for and with others, they know that their life has meaning to the extent that it becomes a free gift for others. Here is the origin of all vocations …’ An emphasis on rights rather than values or duties is not conducive to a decent society. What a great essay: https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2020/01/personalism-and-human-rights/

25/02/2020: And now for some good news: AI discovers antibiotic that kills even highly resistant bacteria: https://www.engadget.com/2020/02/22/ai-discovers-powerful-antibiotic/

25/02/2020: These are the sort of education ‘goals’ which will see our country at the bottom of the heap. What is it with a goal of 60% women in senior positions but 25% male teachers and no goal to improve that? Nothing about improving student results I notice: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/02/mark-scotts-nsw-education-department-gets-shithouse-academic-results-but-look-at-the-diversity.html

24/02/2020: Losing the Mandate of Heaven: Xi has failed too often: swashbuckling in the South China Sea, African Swine Flu, a plague of armyworms, the trade war with the US - and now Covid 19...Is communism in China about to end? https://quillette.com/2020/02/22/losing-the-mandate-of-heaven/ We can only hope so. Mind you I don’t imagine many governments will/would survive the loss of maybe 2% of their population. That’s 500,000 people in Australia. A bit worse than the Granville rail disaster – well worse than WW1 or 2 actually! Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that, but it certainly isn’t looking good.

24/02/2020: Are recovered patients still infective with the virus? This is seriously worrying: https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/china-posts-sharp-drop-in-coronavirus-cases-after-changing-counting-method/news-story/9b4ddb9a2ab9f5a354a032a0d3213637 China is rounding them up again because they are: https://www.news.com.au/world/asia/cured-patients-quarantined-at-coronavirus-epicentre/news-story/4dcf935884223b32785d2eb22d231daa The virus has gone ‘wild’ in Italy, South Korea, and who knows where. Indonesia? Almost certainly. It will be at your door soon, if it is not already inside your door. Think about your strategy for surviving it: https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/coronavirus-is-going-global-and-containment-is-no-longer-an-option/news-story/6b52cf189ba52887bfc0b2a2862fcc49 A trip to the supermarket and the chemist seems in order. Around 20% succumb to the most serious symptoms requiring hospitalisation. Rather a lot of this group do not survive. The human race may be significantly smaller in the months to come. There has been nothing like this in our lifetimes. This may be worse than WW2. It will change so many things.

23/02/2020: Another Cheap Hiking Mat: The Vertex Mattress (which includes a pillow) at 450 grams, generously sized 74.8” x 22.8” with a reasonable R-rating for warmer weather of R 4.2 and an excellent price of US$39.99 (Feb 2020) would have to be good value. If you are shorter like Della and I are you could easily cut this down to 5’6″ (397 grams) or even 5′ (360 grams) to save some weight – yet you still have that generous extra 2.8″ of width. This would be good practice for other DIY heat sealing projects such as pillows and pack rafts. You even get a free fire starter! I cannot spot the height – looks to be about 2″. If you are on a budget this could be for you. In the colder months you could pair it with a cheap closed cell foam mat to add a couple of R-points. Lots of folks at the bottom of Vertex’s page seem happy with it. You might pair it with these cheap down sleeping bags and coats.

PS: You may be eligible for a 10% discount right now (Feb 2020).

This post continues a series about budget hiking. Here are some of the others:

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/11/30/best-5-spent-on-camping-gear-ever/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/03/03/ultralight-hiking-on-a-budget/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/03/24/budget-pack-mods/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/09/07/60-diy-ultralight-hiker-ideas/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/01/01/cheap-down/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/01/12/how-good-is-this/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/09/09/modifyingshortening-hiking-mats/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/06/12/thermoplastics-101/

PS: The pillow I made has become my favourite. I have slept on it every night since i made it around a year ago.

23/02/2020: The Civilisation Emergency: Melanie Phillips has worked out what is going on. The big picture of the climate fiasco and the threat to our way of life. “One of the few geneticists who survived the Stalin era wrote: ‘Lysenko showed how a forcibly instilled illusion, repeated over and over at meetings and in the media, takes on an existence of its own in people’s minds, despite all realities’. To me, we have fallen into this trap”…The “climate emergency”, which we are told threatens the imminent collapse of civilisation and the extinction of humanity, is a dogma being enforced by a culturally totalitarian tyranny. Threatening the living standards of millions, permitting no challenge and wrecking the livelihoods and reputations of any who dares dissent, it has been created by a repudiation of science, humanity and reason: the very markers of modernity and the west. This is the real emergency.” https://www.melaniephillips.com/real-western-civilisation-emergency/

23/02/2020: As an eminent historian I guess it is unsurprising that Keith Windschuttle has astonishing analytical and forensic skills but to have found evidence missed by both prosecution and defence in the Pell case is astounding: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/02/george-pell-and-the-disappearing-priests/

23/02/2020: Climate alarmists were clearly not raised on the same ‘bush poetry’ I was:

Said Hanrahan

By PJ Hartigan writing as John O'Brien

"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan in accents most forlorn,

Outside the church, ere Mass began one frosty Sunday morn.

The congregation stood about coat-collars to the ears,

And talked of stock, and crops, and drought as it had done for years.

"It's looking crook," said Daniel Croke; "Bedad, it's cruke, me lad,

For never since the banks went broke has seasons been so bad."

"It's dry, all right," said young O'Neil, with which astute remark

He squatted down upon his heel and chewed a piece of bark.

And so around the chorus ran, "It's keepin' dry, no doubt."

"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan, "Before the year is out."

"The crops are done; ye'll have your work to save one bag of grain;

From here way out to Back-o'-Bourke they're singin' out for rain.

"They're singin' out for rain," he said, "And all the tanks are dry."

The congregation scratched its head, and gazed around the sky.

"There won't be grass, in any case, enough to feed an ass;

There's not a blade on Casey's place as I came down to Mass."

"If rain don't come this month," said Dan, and cleared his throat to speak -

"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan, "If rain don't come this week."

A heavy silence seemed to steal on all at this remark;

And each man squatted on his heel, and chewed a piece of bark.

"We want an inch of rain, we do, "O'Neil observed at last;

But Croke "maintained" we wanted two, to put the danger past.

"If we don't get three inches, man, or four to break this drought,

We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan, "Before the year is out."

In God's good time down came the rain; and all the afternoon

On iron roof and window-pane it drummed a homely tune.

And through the night it pattered still, and lightsome, gladsome elves

On dripping spout and window-sill kept talking to themselves.

It pelted, pelted all day long, a-singing at its work,

Till every heart took up the song way out to Back-o'-Bourke.

And every creek a banker ran, and dams filled overtop;

"We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan, "If this rain doesn't stop."

And stop it did, in God's good time; and spring came in to fold

A mantle o'er the hills sublime of green and pink and gold.

And days went by on dancing feet, with harvest-hopes immense,

And laughing eyes beheld the wheat nid-nodding o'er the fence.

And, oh, the smiles on every face, as happy lad and lass

Through grass knee-deep on Casey's place went riding down to Mass.

While round the church in clothes genteel discoursed the men of mark,

And each man squatted on his heel, and chewed his piece of bark.

"There'll be bush-fires for sure, me man, there will, without a doubt;

We'll all be rooned," said Hanrahan, "Before the year is out."

22/02/2020: Europe has a problem: http://stuartschneiderman.blogspot.com/2020/02/europe-has-problem.html And Australia - Are We Still Like This?

We're All Australians Now – Banjo Paterson.

Australia takes her pen in hand
To write a line to you,
To let you fellows understand
How proud we are of you.

From shearing shed and cattle run,
From Broome to Hobson's Bay,
Each native-born Australian son
Stands straighter up today.

The man who used to "hump his drum",
On far-out Queensland runs
Is fighting side by side with some
Tasmanian farmer's sons.

The fisher-boys dropped sail and oar
To grimly stand the test,
Along that storm-swept Turkish shore,
With miners from the west.

The old state jealousies of yore
Are dead as Pharaoh's sow,
We're not State children any more —
We're all Australians now!

Our six-starred flag that used to fly
Half-shyly to the breeze,
Unknown where older nations ply
Their trade on foreign seas,

Flies out to meet the morning blue
With Vict'ry at the prow;
For that's the flag the Sydney flew,
The wide seas know it now!

The mettle that a race can show
Is proved with shot and steel,
And now we know what nations know
And feel what nations feel.

The honoured graves beneath the crest
Of Gaba Tepe hill
May hold our bravest and our best,
But we have brave men still.

With all our petty quarrels done,
Dissensions overthrown,
We have, through what you boys have done,
A history of our own.

Our old world diff'rences are dead,
Like weeds beneath the plough,
For English, Scotch, and Irish-bred,
They're all Australians now!

So now we'll toast the Third Brigade
That led Australia's van,
For never shall their glory fade
In minds Australian.

Fight on, fight on, unflinchingly,
Till right and justice reign.
Fight on, fight on, till Victory
Shall send you home again.

And with Australia's flag shall fly
A spray of wattle-bough
To symbolise our unity —
We're all Australians now.

For example: Do we still have one flag, one nation?

22/02/2020: Dangling modifiers: I hate these damned things too: https://owl.purdue.edu/owl/general_writing/mechanics/dangling_modifiers_and_how_to_correct_them.html

22/02/2020: Leo Tolstoy on government: I sit on a man’s back, choking him and making him carry me, and yet assure myself and others that I am very sorry for him and wish to ease his lot by all possible means – except by getting off his back.

21/02/2020: Amps are Everything: It’s hard to find a solar panel which fits on top of a backpack nd can reliably charge eg an 18650 battery/powerbank. This one from Alexpress looks pretty good.

It is 275 x 150 mm (10 ¾” x 6”) and weighs:141 grams. so it should just fit on top of your pack. It puts out 2 amps at 5 volts (10 watts) so it should technically just about charge a single 18650 in an hour supposing you can find a 2 amp charger and cord to go with it. It might be safer to charge two 18650s together at 1 amp through a 2-3 amp charging cord but if hooked up to a 1 amp charger it should do the job safely in just over two hours.

Even on the top of your backpack you should get the equivalent of two hours of bright sunshine dut=ring the course eg of an eight hour hiking day. The 3700 milliamp hours available from a single 1860 battery ought to be enough to charge a small phone, camera battery and torch each day. Given that most of these will only need charging at mst every second day that should be quite enough to keep them topped up and any other electrical gadgets such as an emergency sat phone/communicator and emergency radio text messager such as the Go tenna. At US$12.90 delivered (Feb 2019) it is worth a try.

The diameter of the charging cord is vital to successful charging. Wires are measured in AWG (gauges) the lwer the number being the thicker, as seen below

https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/wire-gauges-d_419.html Here are some cheap 3 amp charging cables (pictured above 5 for US 6.99).

You need to check what amperage your (eg 18650) batteries can handle and how many amps your charger delivers to each battery. Many such batteries can handle around 1.7 amps (each) so that a power bank/charger) which contains two such batteries and can take 3 amps should be fine. I am using the 18650GA flat tops in mine.

Such a charger should charge the two batteries, approximately 12 watts each (at 5 watts times 1.5 amps each = 7.5 watts per hour) in a bit over an hour and a half. It is quite difficult to find a power bank/charger which delivers more than 1 amp each to the contained batteries. The batteries are always wired in parallel so the current is divided between the batteries.

Indeed it it diffcult enough to find one which delivers 1 amp each (.5 amp is more typical) Now perhaps you see why your device/s take so long to charge. Practically all my charging cables proved to be 28AWG wire and so delivered at most .5 amps. As you can see the one above is 20 awg wire and will deliver 3 amps plus to the power bank/charger. There are other cables which promise to deliver 5 amps. Of course length/weight is also a factor.

21/02/2020: In China authorities appear to have halted this plague in its tracks. In the last few days the total number of cases has gone up only a few hundred (instead of the previous few thousand). Let’s hope it is not ‘fake news’. If Japan, Indonesia etc can get on board we may yet avoid the apocalypse.

21/02/2020: In SA all the birds died in vain: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/02/20/david-bidstrup-guest-post-all-the-birds-died-in-vain/ The true beauty of renewables, our energy future: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/sa-renewable-electricity-market-mayhem-as-frequency-stabilizing-costs-hit-record-breaking-90-million/

21/02/2020: Go Pigeons: MAGA Hat-Wearing Pigeons Unleashed in Las Vegas to Protest Democratic Debate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=57&v=mikTBDgnxg4&feature=emb_title Also at another great Trump rally a WWII veteran needed help getting to his seat. These 2 proud Americans stepped up and carried him there: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/02/beautiful-people-at-trump-rally-just-now.html & The moment the two greatest Presidents in American history shook hands: https://michaelsmithnews.typepad.com/.a/6a0177444b0c2e970d0240a4e923db200d-pi The people really do love Donald Trump: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/02/real-people-genuinely-love-president-trump-and-what-hes-doing-for-their-country.html

18/02/2020: The Sleeping Bag Re-Imagined: The wild idea races far ahead of the imagined object. For many years (for me) I tossed up between hammock and tent camping using a 7' x 7' and a 169 gram (including suspension rope) Nano hammock tarp for hammocking, then I started rigging my 8' X 8' cuben tarp for either purpose, but it was only really good for one person as a ground shelter - sometimes the only choice because of the absence of suitable trees - though I attached 'wings' to it so we could use it for either in a pinch.

You can see here how we used to use it here - and it only weighs 200 grams! I am swinging back to silnylon and silpoly instead of cuben fibre though for various reasons, cost (!) for one, but durability also. Now that Tenacious Tape can be used for repairs and waterproof sinylon fabrics are available in 1 oz/yd2 and even .77 oz/yd2 and are much more durable I just don't see the point. I am sick and tired of my cuben fibre stuff sacks shredding just as I tired of my cuben fibre packs doing the same a few years back and am making new silnylon ones.

It is much nicer to have my lovely wife Della's company but sometimes we are forced to take to the trees as the ground is so wet, so how to do this in the lightest way possible? Lightweight hammocks and suspensions for one thing. My new tent/tarp coupled with my double bunking hammock swing solves all these problems - and I daresay we can also use the tarp as the skin of an emergency boat to get ourselves across swollen rivers in our path if the need arises. Multiple use is what it's all about.

I chose my current sleeping bag (that's it above) because it shape-shifts to fit and has plenty of room for my shoulders and arms - and of course it's light, around 550 grams for -2C. I am quite fond of it but it does not thermo -regulate as I imagine future materials might (and be just as comfy from minus to plus 40C) though we have added down to one of mine to make it suitable for trips to Everest. Nor (I think) can it be used to catch fish (as I think future sleeping bags might) or fit in your breast pocket (as they did in Heinlein's 'Tunnel in the Sky' What a great book - download it here).

What other wonders might future sleeping bags have? Could they be waterproof enough so that you could lie in a pool in the rain yet breathable enough so they were bone-dry inside? Could they catch your perspiration, and re-purify it as drinking water like the stillsuits in Frank Herbert's 'Dune'? Could you use one as a parachute? Could they double as clothing? There are already some interesting make-overs to have this happen. I know it is a no-brainer that you can wrap yourself in it of a cold evening before bed. It would be excellent if they were fire-proof so that you did not either melt holes in them around the campfire or when cooking and you could roll yourself in one to save yourself during a wildfire.

In the meantime I am surprised that 1000 fill power down bags are not available yet. This is an obvious weight saving. You should be able to get a zipperless bag made of lightweight materials suitable for around 0C at a weight under 400 grams I would have thought.

18/02/2020: Just another little thing the Chinese may not have been telling the truth about: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8009669/Did-coronavirus-originate-Chinese-government-laboratory.html

17/02/2020: Free electricity from thin air. You may have to wait a while, but what a great idea: https://www.news.com.au/technology/gadgets/mobile-phones/generator-that-uses-bacteria-to-create-electricity-out-of-thin-air-could-soon-be-used-to-power-smartphones-and-wearables/news-story/a001463d3e171140aaebf2f0be18e496

17/02/2020: It wasn't always 'us and them' - & probably isn't today either. A case in point: the Roden family owned a furniture factory in Launceston for many years eventually employing 150 people but begun in their back shed. During the 1929 flood there many people's houses were damaged. The family sent its workmen around with wagons to collect furniture. They rented a warehouse, dried and repaired the flood damaged furniture, then gave it back to their customers, gratis. During the Second World War when many of their employees were away serving their country (mainly in the 40th), Mrs Roden kept their wages for them 'so they would have something to come back to', she said!

17/02/2020: The reality is no-one wanted to buy a Holden. Everyone wanted a HiLux. That is all: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/02/18/will-they-ever-learn-unlikely/

16/02/2020: ‘We have reached a point of diminishing returns in our public life. Hardly anything actually needs doing. We may in fact be past that point; not only does nothing much need doing, but we'd benefit if much of what has been done were to be undone.’ John Derbyshire. One of the first things you learn when you’re a kid (and teach your own): ‘Don’t Steal’! Yet what else is a tax but theft? Taking someone else’s money – in this case by force. Armed robbery in fact. Is this any way for a child or a Government to behave? Government’s problem is it is (far) too big, and spends too much (of other people’s) money. Not satisfied with controlling the currency thence being able to simply print the money it needs for its programmes, it wants it all. Anything which needs doing ought to be left to the private sector. If there is no demand for it, then it didn’t need doing. Not so long ago all the ‘essential services’ we take for granted as Governments’ raisons d’etre (welfare, defence, health, education, police…) were all performed (insofar as they were needed at all) by the private sector. Before it subsumes us quite, we need to take a really big axe to the size of Government and whittle it down to a tiny toothpick – and maybe then discard it altogether!

16/02/2020: The Central England Temperature record (CET) : 350 years of thermometer recording. The most surprising thing about the record is how incredibly stable the temperature has always been: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/02/15/the-rise-and-fall-of-central-england-temperatures-part-3-2000-2019/

16/02/2020: Good on you Boris! This is the solution to the dreadful ABC/SBS: Let those who want it pay for it and get it off our backs. How long will it last once all the dough has to come from the commies do you think? https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/02/boris-to-scrap-bbc-taxpayer-funding-via-govt-bbc-to-charge-subscription-fee-direct-to-viewers-who-wa.html

15/02/2020: Coronavirus: It is bad and getting worse. Take precautions. 10% of humanity could end up dead this year: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/02/14/wuhan-coronavirus-wuwt-update/ & http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/let-the-coronavirus-disruption-begin-partial-post-hoc-reactive-quarantine-holds-seven-planes-at-london-airport-seriously/ This Youtube is even scarier but consistent with 'information' I had from a friend who works for 3m weeks ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnGMI2etU1g&fbclid=IwAR1gid7kLVKI5PbEFfQrDHASzYnORAWgwbuAAblUGHXMr8g8cY_GvIwylKc

15/02/2020: The Little Space Probe Who Can. Voyage 2 comes back online 11.5 billion miles from home: https://newatlas.com/space/voyager-2-back-online/

15/02/2020: Are the Oceans Boiling or is it just another scam? You have probab;ly been concerned at the reported ‘unprecedented’ warming of the waters off Tasmania. ‘The End is Nigh’ guys. Repent and save the planet. Or is it just another conjob such as the parallel one Willis discovered in the waters of North America where the truth is the exact opposite the alarmists want you to know: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/02/14/the-voice-of-the-lobster/

14/02/2020: Curtin University scientists have discovered Earth’s oldest asteroid strike occurred at Yarrabubba, in outback Western Australia, and coincided with the end of a global deep freeze known as a Snowball Earth: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/23/new-research-finds-earths-oldest-asteroid-strike-linked-to-big-thaw/

14/02/2020: Extraordinary, but not unexpected: ‘Greta Thunberg doesn’t write her own Facebook posts. Poor little muppet. They are largely written for her by grown-up environmental activists including her father Svante Thunberg and an Indian delegate to the UN Climate Secretariat called Adarsh Pratap’: https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/01/14/greta-thunbergs-dad-writes-her-facebook-%20/

14/02/2020: More things to worry - Betelgeuse might explode soon (in the next 100,000 years anyway). Should be a spectacular light show: https://www.cnet.com/news/huge-red-star-might-explode-soon-and-next-few-weeks-are-critical/

13/02/2020: Paper Maps App: This is a great App I have just discovered. It opens Pdf Maps and many other types.

If you are tired of Avenza’s version of Pdf Maps only allowing you to open three maps before you hand over cash to them every year – and taking forever to open every map into the bargain (I am). I have a new phone and the trick I used before didn’t want to work, so I went hunting for another App to open Vicmaps Topographical maps in Geopdf format. I found this wonderful App.

This is Della’s favourite place (Hawick Scotland – where her ancestors resided). She won’t get lost there now. I will have to take her there again soon.

Here she is enjoying every minute of it:

It opens a map much more quickly. I guess in less than 30 seconds. Avenza maps used to take minutes, but was much faster if they were already open. It will open: GeoPDF, Geospatial PDF, GeoTIFF, JPEG, KML, KMZ and Shapefile.

You can record GPS tracks, add placemarks and photos, add data layers with schemas, Import your own maps or from Dropbox, Google Drive, OneDrive. 600,000 maps are available in Paper Maps App catalog including 400,000 US Topo maps, US Forest Maps, and Historic Soviet topo maps. Once you have loaded the map it works off-line – and the GPS is very fast and accurate.

Have your own map? Just use it!

Need a map for your journey? Just use one of 600,000 maps available in Paper Maps App! Add placemarks and photos. One map? Or 1,000 maps? Load and use all of them. You can also Organize data in layers or add schemas and styles.

It takes only seconds to get the hang of it. I am sold on this App: https://www.paper-maps.com/

You can download Geoscience Australia’s maps for your particular area and never get lost.

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/10/27/geoscience-australias-free-1250000-topo-maps/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/10/26/never-get-lost-with-google-offline-maps/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2015/03/24/nz-topo-maps-app-for-hiking-in-nz/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/07/20/car-camping-scotland/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/05/26/convert-a-car-to-a-camper-for-50/

13/02/2020: If you had any suspicion that ‘climate change’ was just a giant Ponzi scheme, get this: only 5% of ‘climate research’ money is actually spent on research. This makes charities look good in comparison: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/02/11/too-much-climate-research-money-being-spent-on-science-aeuhhh/ & https://www.thenewamerican.com/tech/environment/item/22402-top-scientist-un-climate-finance-is-subsidy-for-kleptocracy?fbclid=IwAR11DfLEacW10j_wcq1V3lUszhZKrasGQs8gRQhBAAnzOpgoe4FWv3AW8Cg

13/02/2020: It is impossible that Indonesia has no plague cases when nearby Singapore, Malaysia and Australia have. The virus will be doubling every few days there and by now will probably be impossible to stop. We need to block/quarantine people coming (back) from Indonesia urgently: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/02/serious-concerns-about-indonesias-coronavirus-reporting-still-alleged-to-be-zero-cases.html & http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/coronavirus-more-infectious-but-we-hope-less-deadly-without-closed-borders-covid-19-uncontainable/ Clearly they had at least as many as we did three weeks ago and they have been doubling every few days since - so they must have hundreds, even thousands by now!

13/02/2020: Pauline tells the plain truth again and is (naturally) branded a racist, though it is not racist apparently for people to claim to be aborigines and require ‘special treatment’, or expect a hand-out rather than making an effort themselves. She said quite simply, ‘The biggest problem facing Aboriginal Australians today is their own lack of commitment and responsibility to helping themselves.’ Noting one school with 400 children enrolled often had a 50 per cent attendance rate, she said, ‘Whose fault is that? Lazy parents. You can’t blame the whites when it’s your own negligence…When you spend billions of dollars a year on any group of people you expect outcomes but sadly those billions have gone to the nonproductive, unrepentant Aboriginal industry.’ Indigenous people should ‘stop playing the victim. If you want to close the gap, start taking some responsibility for your own people. We’ve provided the schools – it’s now up to you to send your own kids to school. We’ve provided the jobs but it’s up to you to turn up when you’re rostered on, not when it suits. It’s up to the Aboriginals to stay off the grog and the drugs.’ The same comments could also be made about millions of other ‘Australians’ on social welfare wallowing in their ‘victimhood’. People need to rise by their own efforts. It really is as simple as that. It is folly to try to build a society on any other basis.

12/02/2020: Again and again we learn that the benefits of global warming (if it even occurs) are many but the costs of trying to prevent it are horrendous. Just in case you missed the last six such news stories: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/02/10/welcome-warming-again/

12/02/2020: The High Court has gone mad. Its decision to impose apartheid on the nation will now have to be undone by a referendum which makes it clear that the government has no power to make laws based on race – which I though was what happened in 1968, silly me. It is just incredible that someone claiming membership of a race no matter how flimsy the connection is automatically a citizen. This will open such floodgates to millions as it would be ‘racist’ to question them or insist on the minutae of ‘proof’ – DNA perhaps. You will remember that Fauxahontas was shown to have 1-2% Amerind – about the same as the national average. Would that be enough for our High Court? Few in New Guinea or Indonesia for example with which there has been coming and going and no doubt DNA intermingling for centuries would be unable to prove ‘aboriginality’. What happens when instead of carrying a privilege a government decides such membership should carry a penalty – as Hitler decided? Currently Tasmanian ‘aborigines’ are accepted as such with a tiny 1/32nd or 1/64^th ‘aboriginality’ (about the same as Fauxahontas which is preposterous! Honestly no-one can have an allegiance to such a thin percentage of their DNA – or likely even be aware of it. Take the case of the Bird People of Groote Eylandt as an example. They have this rare DNA which arose in Portugal (really!) in the Middle Ages: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2016/07/bird-people-groote-eylandt/ Hopefully the Government will find a way around this ruling: https://www.news.com.au/national/courts-law/high-court-ruling-on-indigenous-deportation-will-lead-to-racial-division-and-strife/news-story/4e03589cbdbfef9f455a753b44b2d725

11/02/2019: How to arrive at fake data: First choose the best baseline for your purpose. NOAA/NASA chooses the coolest 30 years in two centuries as their baseline. Anything would be warmer than that! Then they eliminate all the surface stations which show any cooling over time (around 40% of them), they shift the beginning and end-points, they alter the scale on the vertical axis (to something so small that few instruments could measure it let alone human beings notice it)… https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/15/while-noaa-nasa-claims-2019-as-the-second-warmest-year-ever-other-data-shows-2019-cooler-than-2005-for-usa/ Before they began this jiggery-pokery they had remote long-term temperature sites (such as Cape Otway) showing 2 degrees of cooling since around 1910: This is the Bureau of Met's records for our oldest continuous remote station in Victoria, Cape Otway. You can click on the 'Highlight' box to chose the warmest 5% (95th Percentile). You will see that all the really warm weather was in the C19th If you run your eye down the ‘Annual’ averages (last column), you will also see that in the C19th the temperature was at least 2 degrees warmer than it is today: http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_nccObsCode=36&p_display_type=dataFile&p_startYear&p_stn_num=090015 Rainfall data : http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_nccObsCode=139&p_display_type=dataFile&p_startYear=&p_c=&p_stn_num=090015 Again, if you select “lowest’ you will see that all the driest years were in the C19th. Also see my post for 7/11/2020 for all the other remote long-term sites in Australia – which show the same cooling.

11/02/2019: I expect the High Court to quickly support Pell’s acquittal in mid-March – there was just no opportunity for his alleged offending to have occurred: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/02/the-crown-prosecutors-retraction/

11/02/2019: Some good hard data on coronavirus and like nasties here. Much less to worry about after reading it: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/02/10/wuhan-coronavirus-a-wuwt-scientific-commentary/

10/02/2020: Della: 47 years married to this wonderful man, and still relishing the great adventure of our lives shared. Happy wedding anniversary, Steve Jones!

Della: 47th Wedding Anniversary dinner: I tried doing a selfie shot with both of us in it, but my smart-phone-selfie savvy is well below par, so we had to settle with recording the event in a quick shuffle of turns in the seat without the light washout. The menu was immensely exciting, but all the dishes were sadly eclipsed by the salt-shaker. Fortunately the company and the prosecco were reliably top-notch, as always!

10/02/2020:

10/02/2020: Light, Lighter, Lightest: If things keep going on like this my backpack will have negative mass and will be carrying me! ‘Lead balloons’ will soon actually exist! In fact they were first imagined ‘in 1670 by the Jesuit Father Francesco Lana de Terzi, sometimes referred to as the “Father of Aeronautics“, who published a description of an “Aerial Ship” supported by four copper spheres from which the air was evacuated’. Neat idea: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airship

Of course in reality the spheres would collapse, but we are almost ready to make spheres using graphene scaffolding which is strong enough that they can be evacuated (and refilled) to control lift – so the same may well occur with backpacks, ie backpacks with lift! It’s a wonder you cannot buy a helium lift-assist kit for heavy backpacks already. Of course they might be a bit bulky!

PS: It is somewhat of a surprise that helium actually exists anywhere on earth in that it is light and energetic enough to escape earth’s gravity – and so what does exist should be conserved for more serious purposes than party balloons! The truth is that it is created by radioactive processes deep in the earth and is trapped in certain structures in the crust (such as a few Texas oil wells whence most of the earth’s supply comes). Given that it is a super-conductor at low temperatures and may have all sorts of other strange properties (eg as a solid!) we probably should conserve it somewhat more than koala bears (which are as common as wombats around here)!

Gossammer Gear have long been pioneers in ways to reduce your pack weight. I have posted about various of their products over the years including their carbon fibre hiking poles, backpacks, Airflow Sitlight Seats Polycro Ground Sheets and so forth.

Here are some really nice lightweight ideas I found there today in their Accessories section:

These micro dripper bottles are even smaller and lighter than their earlier ones. These little guys only weigh 1.95 grams each and hold 3 mls so they are ideal for eg a small quantity of iodine or insect repellent. You should add them to your collection of small is beautiful ideas such as this and this.

This ultralight (3.5 grams) toothbrush for only a dollar deserves to join your war on weight: https://www.gossamergear.com/collections/accessories/products/toothbrush

Some natural silk floss sachets at US3.99 have to be a ‘must’ – and you could use them for fishing.

This hands-free umbrella clamp has to be a great idea at US$5.99. A pity ‘Rambling Hemlock’ didn’t patent hers – perhaps she did.

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/08/30/a-gorilla-in-the-bush/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/01/25/gossamer-gear-air-flow-sitlight-camp-seat/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2017/11/22/ultralight-ground-sheet/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/10/16/small-is-beautiful/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2017/05/10/the-ultralight-fisherman/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2014/08/18/single-use-antibiotic-packs/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2017/12/14/a-hands-free-umbrella/

10/02/2020: Do you tell your children wild camping is illegal? I think this is such a good title for a post. It is up there with my post title Nuts to Leave No Trace. The Nanny State wowsers would ban all fun if they could. The author is from the UK. One thing which surprised me during our trip around Scotland last year was how much freer hikers and campers had it there than here. Scotland is 17% forest (more than Victoria) and you may walk and/or camp anywhere on it. You may also walk across private land anywhere ‘as of right’. England is more crowded and more rule-bound apparently. I am not especially looking forward to our trip there – but I guess we have to go and see where the ‘ancestors’ came from sometime.

The author has some tips about encouraging children in the worthy civil disobedience of ‘free or stealth camping’. I couldn’t agree more.

One of my all-time favourite books is Thoreau’s Walden and On the Duty of Civil Disobedience which you can download and read for free from the link. The alternative title might be more evocative for you: ‘Life in the Woods’.

Thoreau retired (c1820) to a tiny remote cabin in the woods (near Walden Pond) where he chose to live a life of simple self-sufficiency – an inspiration now to many generations of us who have essayed to emulate him. it is a great read and always on my phone when I venture into the trackless wilderness which I often do, thank goodness.

Tom Smallwood discusses the delicate chore of telling your children that what you are doing ie camping on someone else’s land is illegal, but alright to do nonetheless. The idea of raising a tribe of such young anarchists strikes a chord with me. Here in Victoria much of our camping (eg in National Parks, & even perhaps on waterways may be technically illegal, but should be encouraged nonetheless – so long as you don’t leave a mess or spook the sheep!

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/01/04/nuts-to-leave-no-trace/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/05/01/the-littlest-hiker/

Walden

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/05/23/the-ultimate-hunting-trip/

10/02/2020: 1000 FP Down Vest: Just 150 grams and US$49.92 this little guy would make the perfect partner to its big brother the Naturehike 1000 FP Down Jacket which was on sale last week, sold out (at $60!) but is back again this week for US$ 67.43 – just in case you missed out!

It has both hand warmer pockets outside and generous storage pockets inside.

These two garments with a combined weight of 324 grams will allow you to get out in really cold sub-zero weather. Get one now at Aliexpress.

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/01/01/cheap-down/

10/02/2019: Around 50% of domestic violence is ignored eg the kind where men are the victims: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2020/02/when-men-are-victims-of-domestic-violence/

10/02/2019: Still no certainty about coronavirus – may be much worse than official ‘news’, nasty doings in China and now may spread through the air: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/corona-virus-darkness-in-china-the-west-waits-while-reports-come-that-a-mild-illness-may-progress-badly/

10/02/2019: 2,000 years: Seeds can last a long time: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/57817

09/02/2019: “This world, which is the same for all, no one of gods or men has made. But it always was and will be: an ever-living fire, with measures of it kindling, and measures going out” (Heraclitus of Ephesus c500BC) One of my all-time favourites. I also love, “No man ever steps in the same river twice.” The Universe is vast; it is more than likely there are many ‘Gods’ ie creatures so much more advanced than us as to be wholly incomprehensible, somewhere out among the stars – perhaps even an infinite number of them, whatever that means…but neither they nor anyone else made the universe, nor have they any concern for the affairs of man, any more than you have any concern for the tiniest ant you unknowingly crush underneath your feet! Such illusory thoughts are merest delusion; a mistake of scale: when you are high on a mountain looking down on the vast panorama before you, you might well say, Well, this is reality’, but when you lie down on your belly and peer beneath the blades of grass to see perhaps an ant crawling over a grain of sand (mayhap bearing a speck of dung on her shoulders not unlike the world), you might well say the same thing, ‘This is reality’. Theology is all a mistake of scale, like so many errors. To ourselves, and our loved ones we are all-important – as it should be, but in the mighty scheme of things we are less than dust – and, it doesn’t matter! We are not that very far from our remote proto-lemur ancestors hiding in the green gloom of a primaeval jungle, peering out between the fronds at the passing giants…http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heraclitus

09/02/2019: The Best is Yet to Come – He can and will win in 2020: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=215&v=aDrtQlN6CkY&feature=emb_title

09/02/2019: Some more good news - in race for coronavirus vaccine Imperial College London team hope to be testing vaccine on animals as early as next week: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/02/05/uk-scientists-make-significant-breakthrough-race-coronavirus/ In China the rate of increase of infection has slowed a lot: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/coronavirus-hope-first-sign-of-a-slow-down/

08/02/2019: Pompeii's ancient drains are STILL in working order and will be used again to empty rainwater into the sea 2,300 years after they were built. Pompeii used to be a raunchy seaport before sea levels fell: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-7973567/Pompeiis-ancient-drainage-set-used-2-000-years-built.html

08/02/2019: Pelosi has torn up the American Dream and the Democrats’ feeble chance of winning in 2020. Watch Trump's tweet on it here: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/02/powerful-american-stories-ripped-to-shreds-by-nancy-pelosi.html

08/02/2019: Are these floods now caused by ‘climate change’ just as the drought and fires of just a few weeks back apparently were? This is what we used to call ‘weather’. Dorothea MacKellar was a better predictor of future ‘climate’ than AGW prognosticators. There is nothing at all you can do to prevent weather happening, but you can spend money on preparing for it, eg building dykes and levees around western river towns. NB Stanzas 2 & 4:

‘The love of field and coppice
Of green and shaded lanes,
Of ordered woods and gardens
Is running in your veins.
Strong love of grey-blue distance,
Brown streams and soft, dim skies
I know, but cannot share it,
My love is otherwise.

I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains.
I love her far horizons,
I love her jewel-sea,
Her beauty and her terror
The wide brown land for me!

The stark white ring-barked forests,
All tragic to the moon,
The sapphire-misted mountains,
The hot gold hush of noon,
Green tangle of the brushes
Where lithe lianas coil,
And orchids deck the tree-tops,
And ferns the warm dark soil.

Core of my heart, my country!
Her pitiless blue sky,
When, sick at heart, around us
We see the cattle die
But then the grey clouds gather,
And we can bless again
The drumming of an army,
The steady soaking rain.

Core of my heart, my country!
Land of the rainbow gold,
For flood and fire and famine
She pays us back threefold.
Over the thirsty paddocks,
Watch, after many days,
The filmy veil of greenness
That thickens as we gaze ...

An opal-hearted country,
A wilful, lavish land
All you who have not loved her,
You will not understand
though Earth holds many splendours,
Wherever I may die,
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.’

‘These fires have been a gift to the Marxist fantasists who manipulate the international climate conspiracy for their own ideological ends and the useful idiots who parrot their apocalyptic predictions in the media and elsewhere.’ https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/doomed-planet/2020/02/the-flame-blame-game/

07/02/2019: No-one may disagree with the Left no matter what the evidence (eg that men are only responsible for approx half of domestic violence – what sort of nasty people do this stuff anyway? Scum basically – mostly the welfare class) https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-01-30/bettina-arndt-should-be-stripped-of-honour-victorian-a-g-says/11912178

07/02/2019: Prof Ian Plimer a scientific adult in the room: https://www.spectator.com.au/2020/02/global-warming-meet-creationism/

07/02/2019: Elizabeth Warren (Fauxahontas); how crazy can the Left get? ‘A young trans person will have veto power over my choice for Secretary of Education’: https://hotair.com/archives/allahpundit/2020/01/30/elizabeth-warren-young-trans-person-will-veto-power-secretary-education/

06/02/2019: After Brexit what’s next for Europe: https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/uk-came-went-leaving-europe-mess

06/02/2019: ‘This is not only one of the most disgraceful episodes in Australian history; it has now become one of the country’s most heroic stories of manly fortitude and Christian forbearance. Despite all he’s been put through, George Pell is unbroken.’ Sometime in March we will know the result: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/02/05/if-you-can-describe-not-seeing-the-non-existent-as-ignoring-it/

06/02/2019: I suspect it is worse than the official figures indicate. 25,000 already dead? Let’s hope it’s not, but: https://twitter.com/hashtag/Wuhan?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1224645501477195776&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fjoannenova.com.au%2F & http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/coronavirus-huge-ghost-statistics-mysteriously-come-and-go-a-hint-of-much-worse/

06/02/2019: A great speech but all the Dems can do is hiss when record unemployment is mentioned or tear up the speech. They haven’t got a prayer in this years Presidential election: https://pjmedia.com/trending/trumps-was-the-most-muscular-consequential-state-of-the-union-in-years/

05/02/2019: ‘It’s disheartening that an avowed socialist is a viable candidate for president of the United States. Socialism is a dead end. For hundreds of years, it has failed everywhere it’s been adopted. The enthusiasm of our youth for the candidacy of Bernie Sanders is a symptom of our failure to educate them, not only in history, government and economics, but also basic morality…Socialism isn’t so much a legitimate economic system as it is a moral failing. It will always exist because ignorant people will always want something for nothing. If we want to retain our freedom and prosperity, then we must educate our children that the purpose of government is to secure liberty, not provide free lunches.’ Professor David Deming

05/02/2019: The Palestinian Authority rejects statehood, but will not renounce terror. Why should we send them $43 million we could better spend on fire/drought remediation for example: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/01/update-on-our-twitter-poll-should-australia-send-43m-to-support-palestinian-abbass-policy-agenda.html Why fund schools that teach kids to kill Jews? https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/01/we-fund-schools-in-the-palestinian-territories-that-trains-kids-to-kill-jews.html but Twenty-three nations embrace Trump peace plan, 7 in Middle East

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/washington-secrets/23-nations-embrace-trump-peace-plan-7-in-middle-east

05/02/2019: ‘Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver met a chap in the Grand Academy of Lagado who had ‘been eight years upon a project for extracting sunbeams out of cucumbers… He told me, he did not doubt, that, in eight years more, he should be able to supply the governor’s gardens with sunshine, at a reasonable rate: but he complained that his stock was low, and entreated me “to give him something as an encouragement to ingenuity”… The extreme version of the precautionary principle in the Lisbon Treaty is killing innovation: instead of ‘better safe than sorry’, it scores any future hazard, however small, but ignores any future benefit, however large. The principle demands that if a product is not known to be safe then it must be deemed dangerous, even if it is far safer than the existing technology it replaces. Thus the EU threatens to ban glyphosate herbicide on precautionary grounds even though the EU’s own food safety authority says it is less likely to be carcinogenic than coffee. And coffee is actually drunk, which herbicide is not’ http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/innovation/

04/02/2019: A Gallup poll found that 85 percent of people hate their jobs. Of course, but somebody has to do it: https://quillette.com/2020/01/30/work-the-tragedy-of-our-age/

04/02/2019: Let me see, people opposed to global warming would rather live during the last Ice Age? Perhaps under the sea? Or a mile underneath an ice sheet? These were the perfect conditions for life on earth? Meanwhile… More evidence that things are getting colder: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/31/rutgers-university-global-snow-lab-and-the-snows-of-yesteryear/ & https://notrickszone.com/2020/01/23/new-study-3c-cooling-in-the-last-200-years-7c-warmer-7800-years-ago-in-france/ & https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/30/warming-and-the-snows-of-yesteryear/

04/02/2019: Sounds promising: ‘A Chinese woman infected with the new coronavirus showed a dramatic improvement after she was treated with a cocktail of anti-virals. The 71-year-old patient tested negative for the virus 48 hours after Thai doctors administered the combination. "From being exhausted before, she could sit up in bed 12 hours later." The doctors combined the anti-flu drug oseltamivir with lopinavir and ritonavir, anti-virals used to treat HIV’: https://www.dailysabah.com/health/2020/02/02/thailand-cures-coronavirus-with-anti-hiv-drug-cocktail-in-48-hours

03/02/2019: It’s all good news from China – a sign their government has lost ‘the mandate of heaven’ I suspect and will soon be gone – and good riddance! Coronavirus death rate could be as high as 110%: https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/helth/health-problems/new-lancet-paper-says-coronavirus-mortality-rate-could-be-as-high-as-11-per-cent/news-story/a5d5506601ef56bcc7b2de4e31b64af7 & https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/health/health-problems/china-detects-outbreak-of-bird-flu-near-epicentre-of-deadly-coronavirus/news-story/867e889095a9461fa352c824e33d2c36

03/02/2019: Breaking News: Punxsutawney to retire Phil the groundhog, replace him with Greta Thunberg: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/02/02/punxsutawney-to-retire-phil-the-groundhog-replace-him-with-greta-thunberg/

03/02/2019: Life removes CO2 almost as quickly as we can add it, therefore predictions of dire happenings as a result of it are misplaced. Surprisingly the human percentage of CO2 has sat stubbornly at 3-4% since it was first measured (isotopically) in the 1950s, despite all the stuff we have burned since. That fertilization has added roughly two Australia’s of forested area since then, and enhanced life everywhere (huge crop increases for example) and especially in the oceans (75% of he surface after all) It will peak at less than a doubling: http://www.drroyspencer.com/2020/02/will-humanity-ever-reach-2xco2-possibly-not/ & https://judithcurry.com/2020/01/31/analysis-of-a-carbon-forecast-gone-wrong-the-case-of-the-ipcc-far/

03/02/2019: Watch your arse Biden: Now we may see who is the criminal in this: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/02/fmr-ukrainian-prosecutor-general-shokin-files-criminal-complaint-against-joe-biden.html?fbclid=IwAR0AFhpQKQTF4UtotwYFN6wlP8c8NVRz9EBe5SLKA3wBFK7Mo6rKctRwHkc Also notice this: Julian Assange: ‘I investigated both presidential candidates — Hillary was the only one with corrupt ties to Russia.’ https://twitter.com/DeepStateExpose?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1220178713091985409&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.michaelsmithnews.com%2F PS: The Left are seriously deranged if they think the American people will vote for commies like Sanders or Warren. Hilary Clinton said, “Nobody likes” Sanders. He was in Congress for years. He had one senator support him. Nobody likes him. Nobody wants to work with him. He got nothing done. He was a career politician. It's all just baloney, and I feel so bad that people got sucked into it.”

03/02/2019: If you doubted for a minute that the UN and more relevantly at present the WHO was run by (real) communists, get a look at this guy (their head) and his groveling apologia for Chinese neglect in spreading the current contagion (let alone starting it with its dreadful food and hygiene practices). Of course he is supported by our own communists at the ABC and the even worse Al Jazeera (Islamic terrorist) dominated mob at SBS. Why does the Oz public continue to fund all these dreadful people: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/02/stinks-slow-wmo-let-coronavirus-run-but-ethiopian-chief-was-part-of-chinas-debt-trap-diplomacy/

02/02/2019: The Shards of Bruce Pascoe’s (‘Dark Emu’) delusion: where is all the aboriginal pottery if they were Neolithic – as he claims: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/bennelong-papers/2020/01/aboriginal-history-goes-to-pot/

02/02/2019: Oh, the ‘fake news’! Sceptical Environmentalist Bjorn Lomburg in ‘The Australian’, When the media suggests Australia’s fires are “unprecedented in scale”, it is wrong. Australia’s burnt area declined by more than a third from 1900 to 2000, and has declined across the satellite period. This fire season, at the time of writing, 2.5 per cent of Australia’s area has burned compared with the past 10 years’ 4.8 per cent average by this point.’ https://www.theaustralian.com.au/inquirer/we-dont-have-money-to-burn-on-green-mania/news-story/44a9ad8065392ff2908667d0518ef93f ‘Like snow upon the desert’s dusky face’: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/02/01/cold-wave-grips-northern-saudi-arabia-meteorologists-fear-strongest-cold-snap-ever/

02/02/2019: The WHO (World Health Organisation & the UN generally) have proved themselves completely hopeless against coronavirus. If countries had not begun (far too slowly – particularly China, but Oz too) to impose their own travel/quarantine restrictions (Yes they would hurt economically too – just as millions of dead would, but not so permanemtly or tragically) then we would certainly have had a pandemic – may still have one. Like everything else at the UN the WHO are just a trough, a huge gathering of self-congratulatory communistic public servants (read ‘masters’) bent only on their own aggrandizement - and world domination. We should reject the UN and all its awful ideas, UNESCO (listing), and the IPCC for example, its ‘refugees’ policy (open borders and an end to citizenship everywhere), its support of terrorism and criminality generally by for example requiring us to abolish the death penalty for even the most heinous of crimes – and so on and so forth. The UN may not be the font of all the evils in the world but it is a pretty handy boxful of them. It does not deserve to exist, let alone to have any support from us. Some good news: This morning the recovered (287) outnumber the dead (259) – but just. I would like to see the ‘risk’ of recovery edging well ahead of the ‘risk’ of death. Clearly this is a hard bug to shake off – particularly for the frail, elderly (as usual) – like me? Precautionary prevention strategies are well-deserved.

01/02/2019: 24 Days Ago China was where we are now. Let’s hope we can contain this monster: https://e.infogram.com/d5f1e482-d4d4-4e41-9332-155aa503b5e1?parent_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.news.com.au%2Flifestyle%2Fhealth%2Fhealth-problems%2Faustralian-coronavirus-cases-at-9-as-qantas-heads-to-china-to-pick-up-evacuees%2Fnews-story%2Fe1b84297504cafa47c614af643ab7bbc&src=embed#async_embed

01/02/2019: Imagine that monarch butterfly numbers have dropped by 90% because of an excess of cold weather: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/30/saving-our-monarch-butterflies-part-1/ Who would have thought snowfall has actually been increasing: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/30/warming-and-the-snows-of-yesteryear/ & https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/31/rutgers-university-global-snow-lab-and-the-snows-of-yesteryear/

01/02/2019: Good on you Pete – you can deport a lot more unwanted immigrants as far as I’m concerned. A few hundred thousand come to mind. Still 10 X Labor’s record is a big improvement in the right direction: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/01/peter-dutton-deporting-3-crooks-per-day-5023-in-the-past-5-years.html

01/02/2019: Absolutely Vera (1945): https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=_qhLPWcm-0w&feature=emb_title Please, can we in Australia have our own Ausexit and an end to multiculturalism?

31/01/2019: Wow! Free Electricity. Some people will believe anything: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/29/another-sure-to-fail-green-idea-power-your-home-for-24-hours-with-a-bicycle/

31/01/2019: Climate Flashback: August 1946:

http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/01/30/roundup-30-jan/

31/01/2019: Dracula on Gratitude: https://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2020/01/dracula-on-economic-growth.html

31/01/2019: Of course it’s a thing: The Dangerous Rise of Men Who Won't Date 'Woke' Women. ‘And now they're complaining that men are saying, "I don't want to date a sex-negative quasi-religious-maniac harridan shrew"?’: http://ace.mu.nu/archives/385514.php Dating is just too difficult. Thank goodness I am old – and happily married for c50 years!

30/01/2019: No finer epitaph could I have than‘, He ate what was set before him,’ Robert Heinlein, ‘Starman Jones’, p. 234. (Great title!) The prevailing sense of ‘entitlement’ is SO wrong. We have only this life, not some yearned for fairy-tale. Grab life with both hands. Carpe that old Diem. ie ‘Seize the day’. Enjoy!

30/01/2019: New Study shows 3°C Cooling In The Last 200 Years, 7°C Cooler than ~7800 Years Ago. So, how much cooler does it have to get before we start to worry about the next Ice Age? https://notrickszone.com/2020/01/23/new-study-3c-cooling-in-the-last-200-years-7c-warmer-7800-years-ago-in-france/ This is what I have been saying about all the long-term temperature sites whose raw data all show cooling. This is the Bureau of Met's records for our oldest continuous remote station in Victoria, Cape Otway. You can click on the 'Highlight' box to chose the warmest 5% (95th Percentile). You will see that all the really warm weather was in the C19th If you run your eye down the ‘Annual’ averages (last column), you will also see that in the C19th the temperature was at least 2 degrees warmer than it is today: http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_nccObsCode=36&p_display_type=dataFile&p_startYear&p_stn_num=090015

30/01/2019: These fires are now so intense due to the shocking (10 X) build-up of fuels in ‘protected’ areas that they are now 100 times worse and just kill everything with no prospect of regeneration. Managing public lands (National Parks) in this way is not just neglectful it is the Holocaust! We must abolish National Parks and bring back a more diverse set of uses of public lands – as well as much more regular fuel reduction (ie annually!). The Baw Baws and Dandenongs are an unimaginable disaster just waiting to happen. If these Areas should ignite (and Green/Islamic eco-terrorists will ensure they do) during a strong North-East wind the resultant fire could actually destroy Melbourne. I mean possibly millions dead: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/01/off-the-charts-current-fires-are-20-times-more-intense-than-the-largest-fires-humans-can-control/

29/01/2019: Refurbished Xiaomi Phones from US$50: https://www.dx.com/lp/20200127_Xiaomi_en?utm_source=dx&utm_medium=edm&utm_campaign=20200127_Xiaomi_en&Utm_rid=12787464

29/01/2019: Israel Folau’s explanation of the current bushfires deserves some examination. We need to put it beside those who argue for CO2 and those who argue for fuel and arsonists as a cause. Israel sees the fires as obviously coming from the introduction of same-sex marriage. This is a no-brainer really. Most people foresaw dire consequences from this obvious mistake. Clearly simply repealing it will put the fires out instantly. Folau’s ‘argument’ relies on a. the existence of God, b. her response to homosexuality on this occasion – after all in the distant past s/he destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah and turned Lot’s wife into a pillar of salt, then allowed him to breed with both his daughters! God clearly prefers incest to homosexuality – as all right thinking people should. Tracing this cause-effect relationship in a scientific peer-reviewed manner might be difficult. Experiments to prove the existence of god/s have so far failed miserably too. No such problem with CO2. Since around 1820 scientists have been able to measure the percentage of it in the atmosphere and have usually found it to be between .03 and .05% according to my 1950s High School Chemistry textbook, with many hundreds of thousands of results well above today’s percentage, often as high as .07% But we should ignore all that. We should also ignore all the evidence of global cooling. However we should not despair. We can always just keep on asserting that increased (or reduced – whichever it is) CO2 is the cause of many dire (and wonderful) things without any evidence at all – just as the other religious advocates do. Or, we could just come at the issue with a little experience of lighting thousands of winter fires (to warm ourselves) as country folk have needed to do since time immemorial. When you have very little fuel or the fuel is wet and cold and you have no matches or chimney it is very, very difficult to get a fire started. On the other hand when you have young arsonists in the house (as we always did) really keen to get one going and you have gathered together bone-dry tinder, kindling and lots of fuel in a hot, dry environment with lots of updraught it is ridiculously simple.

29/01/2019: The upside of Armageddon: Quebec politician and radio talk show host Luc Ferrandez has suggested that the coronavirus has had one “positive” outcome for the city of Wuhan, China—it’s reduced the carbon footprint. On Saturday, he tweeted: “Wuhan. No automobile traffic. No air flights. The only city on the planet that will meet its GHG reduction targets”. This is of course what the Greens advocate – a massive reduction in the number of human beings achieved quickly. They could even get 10% out of coronavirus.

28/01/2019: Australia Day 2019: Latrobe River near Rosedale:

28/01/2019: George Orwell had it right: ‘There are some ideas so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them’

28/01/2019: 75 years since the liberation of (‘Work makes you free’) Auschwitz. How wonderful that 200 survivors can attend: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/01/australia-to-take-part-in-the-ceremony-to-mark-the-75th-anniversary-of-the-liberation-of-auschwitz-.html

28/01/2019: Also 75 years later: Remains of US pilot downed on D-Day identified: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/57585

25/01/2019: Della: ‘This little sweetheart was out to welcome us home as we approached our driveway this evening. We had just encountered a goanna on our afternoon walk in the local pine plantation along with a couple of echidnas and the usual handful of wallabies and roos, and I am currently listening to one of our resident possums galloping thunderously across our iron roof.
"There's no place like home," Dorothy...’

25/01/2019: What a good idea: El Paso Zoo teases return of naming cockroaches after exes, feeding them to meerkats: https://cbsaustin.com/news/local/el-paso-zoo-teases-return-of-naming-cockroaches-after-exes-feeding-them-to-meerkats

25/01/2019: It doesn’t take Vesuvius to do this. You can see right through some people: http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/57668

25/01/2019: Julian Simon noted that “human creation is greater than human destruction, in the sense that our environment is becoming progressively more hospitable to humankind.” A clear choice: Would you prefer the free market and prosperity or that the greens win and we have the return of the dead hand of socialism? https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/20/on-the-climate-road-to-serfdom/

25/01/2019: ‘There’s no smear if there’s no crime. It shouldn’t matter if Ukraine conducts an investigation if Biden is innocent... Every one of the 63 million Americans who voted for Donald Trump should be incandescent with rage about the impeachment trial under way in the Senate. This shameful pantomime is the culmination of a three-year temper tantrum by the Democrats for their 2016 loss. It is therapy for Trump Derangement Syndrome, at your expense’ https://nypost.com/2020/01/22/impeachment-trial-is-dems-misdirection-devine/

24/01/2019:

24/01/2019: If his recent fire-fighting efforts don’t convince you. A quote just to remind you who was our greatest ever Prime Minister – yet we threw him away. At Davos in 2014 Tony Abbott delivered one of the greatest speeches of modern times. It is not very long. You should read every word of it. Some snippets: ‘It’s worth noting – if only to remind ourselves of the good that can be done – that in the past few decades, more has been achieved to reduce poverty than in any other period in history… Mostly, though, it’s been driven by the intellectual and philosophical conviction that freer trade and smaller government will strengthen prosperity; the instinct that empowered citizens can do more for themselves than government will ever do for them…You can’t spend what you haven’t got. No country has ever taxed or subsidised its way to prosperity. You don’t address debt and deficit with yet more debt and deficit. And profit is not a dirty word because success in business is something to be proud of…A certain level of government spending is necessary and good. In Lincoln’s words, government should do for people what they can’t do for themselves – and no more…As always, stronger economic growth is the key to addressing almost every global problem. Stronger growth requires lower, simpler and fairer taxes that don’t stifle business creativity. And stronger growth requires getting government spending under control so that taxes can come down; and reducing regulation so that productivity can rise…We’re determined that fit working age people will work, preferably for a wage but, if not, as a condition of receiving unemployment benefits…After all, government doesn’t create wealth; people do, when they run profitable businesses. Government’s role is always to nurture its citizens rather than to promote itself…Better governance, though, is not the same as more government.’

http://www.pm.gov.au/media/2014-01-23/address-world-economic-forum-davos-switzerland-0

24/01/2019: Michael Crichton’s ‘State of Fear’ warned us of the excesses we could expect from eco-terrorists. (http://www.michaelcrichton.com/state-of-fear/) It is no surprise to me that we have had dreadful fires this year in NSW and Victoria – most deliberately lit, and certainly helped on in their destructiveness by decades of green land mismanagement, if not deliberately lit by an organized campaign by greenie activists which I strongly suspect. All my fairly long life we have had hot dry summers often with standing dry grass everywhere up to your knees, yet pretty much until this century there was very little danger of fire, yet nearly every year of this century so far we have been on ‘fire-watch’ here at Jeeralang Junction as one lunatic or another deliberately lights huge fires intended to destroy property (at least two attempts at the Hazelwood Power Station for example), and to destroy lives - as several of them have. We used to go away (up the bush) for holidays every summer, but this century we are stuck here until the autumn break. Last time I was away in late Feb was in 2000 when I heard a moose calling from the Supper Cove Hut. Every year since I have wanted to be back there during the moose ‘rut’ to try and get a photo of one, but my normal visits are late April or even May before it is safe to leave. (https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/01/08/the-lure-of-the-moose/) And Australia is running out of electricity and prosperity. Let’s destroy the Greens! Mind you I have decided that since the Government will not perform fuel reduction burns it needs to be cool season bush users such as 4WDers, fishers, hunters, hikers etc who do. When we are in the bush autumn to early spring we should set fire to whatever will burn at every opportunity. Unlike My Lai the bush really does need to be ‘destroyed in order to save it’ as Calley so famously said (of the village): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Lai_Massacre Crichton Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBCFus0927s Goto 43:00 where he says (back in 2005) what will happen if you ‘save’ a forest!

23/01/2019:

23/01/2019: Nitecore 550 Lumen Head Torch: What a great new head torch I managed to pick up from Deal Extreme for under US$30! Equipped with a CREE XP-G3 S3 LED, the NU32 emits a bright 550 lumens extending out to 125 metres/408 feet. In addition to this primary LED, which offers four different brightness modes, the NU32 also features high-CRI auxiliary LEDs that can be activated for close-range tasks, like reading and repairs. It weighs just 98 gram/3.5 ounces including its comfortable headband. Engineered with a 1800mAh/50-hour rechargeable battery, it won’t stop during critical tasks either.

LED: CREE XP-G3 S3 LED
Maximum brightness: 550 lumens
Peak beam distance: 408 ft (124.4 m)
Peak beam intensity: 3900 cd
IP rating: IP67
Impact resistance: 3.3 ft (1 m)
Dimensions: 2.5 x 1.7 x 1.7 in (6.3 x 4.3 x 4.3 cm)
Weight: 3.51 oz (99.5 g)

Brightness Outputs

Turbo mode: 550 lumens, 1 hour runtime
High mode: 190 lumens, 17 hour runtime
Mid mode: 33 lumens, 50 hour runtime
Ultra low mode: 1 lumen, 330 hour runtime
Auxiliary high CRI mode: 19 lumens, 25 hour runtime
Red mode: 9 lumens, 38 hour runtime
Flashing red illumination mode: 9 lumens, 45 hour runtime
Beacon mode: 550 lumens
SOS mode: 550 lumens

Looks good with a ripe Plumcot from or garden too doesn't it? I've modelled it below:

That beard needs a trim!

They seem to have sold out at dx.com but they are incorrectly listed. They still have 10,000 of them! They also have the Nitecore HC60 Cree XM - L2 U2 1000LM LED Headlamp for US$47.95. I also picked up the new Nitecore Concept 1 1800 lumen single 18650 battery (61.9 gram) torch for US$54 - more about that later! They also have the Tube, Tiny Thumb and Tip mini rechargeable torches I wrote about before at a very reasonable price.

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/08/22/smallest-rechargeable-flashlight/

I use the Tube all the time when I am hiking:

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/09/27/11-gram-rechargeable-head-torch/

23/01/2019: Quote of the day: "The more I study the history of intellectuals, the more they seem like a wrecking crew, dismantling civilization bit by bit — replacing what works with what sounds good." - Thomas Sowell

23/01/2019: More of that rain that wasn’t going to fall according to the BOM. Remember their saying ‘there would be no significant rain until April’? Here at Jeeralang Junction we have been having one of those ‘green summers’ when the grass just keeps on growing. We deliberately did not buy any hay this year because of the BOM’s forecast which is always wrong! We have not sold lambs as they are just growing and growing and needed to keep the grass down. January so far we just get am inch of rain every week and generally mild weather. We have just had over an inch of rain again overnight and it just keeps falling. The rivers are up again, so we are off to canoe the Wonnangatta for 3-4 days as soon as it clears.

23/01/2019: President Trump’s three years of accomplishments. Do likewise Scomo. Ignore the fake news: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=4&v=EsrUzPXrygQ&feature=emb_title

22/01/2019: A skeptical environmentalist’s view of the ‘unprecedented’ fires: http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/01/19/another-climate-roundup-19-jan/

22/01/2019: The grown-up in the room: Donald to Greta: “We must reject the perennial prophets of doom and their predictions of the apocalypse.” In full: ‘This is not a time for pessimism, this is a time for optimism. Fear and doubt is not a good process...to embrace the possibilities of tomorrow we must reject the perennial profits of doom and their warnings about the apocalypse. They are the heirs of yesterday's foolish fortune tellers...they want to see us do badly, but we won't let that happen. They predicted an overpopulation crisis in the 1960s, mass starvation in the 70s and the end of oil in the 1990s. These alarmists always demand the same thing - absolute power to dominate transform and control every aspect of our lives. We will never let radical socialists destroy our economy, wreck our country or eradicate our liberty. America will always be the proud, strong and unyielding bastion of freedom.’ You just want to cheer and cheer!

22/01/2019: One little hailstorm – a regular event anyway and you have no electricity. ‘Renewables’, such a great idea. The sort of thing a 16 year old half-witted school drop-out would come up with: http://joannenova.com.au/2020/01/unprecedented-hail-phenomal-damage-in-canberra-1871-1877-1897-1919-1936-1956-1963/

22/01/2019: Fourteen Days of White Water: The Wonnangatta-Mitchell is Victoria greatest river. It rises deep in a wonderful remote wilderness that is the heart of Gippsland and finally finishes (weeks later) at the amazing ‘Silt Jetties’ where it enters Lake King. It can be canoed (when there is sufficient water, ie approx 1.8 metres on the Waterford Gauge) from the Humffray River confluence at the base of the Wombat Spur, the beginning of the ‘Wonnangatta Station’ deep in the Alpine National Park. There are 14 easy days of delightful white water canoeing from there to the Glenaladale Bridge near Lindenow. From that bridge there is still an excellent week’s paddling on flat water to Lake King. Along its whole length there are vast opportunities for memorable camping – and other adventures.

This weekend there will be enough water to canoe it. You need to keep a ‘weather eye’ on the rainfall patterns and river heights. This post Canoeing the Wonnangatta, Catching the Wave will help you decide.

We have canoed most sections of it many times and I have previously posted about all of the white water sections. These posts begin with a pack rafting trip from the Humffray confluence to Eaglevale. We have also been down this section in Canadian canoes a number of times. That trip mostly through a serene remote forest far from tracks, roads, habitations etc takes at least two days but would be better enjoyed over three (or more). Here are my two posts about it:

Pack Rafting the Remote Wonnangatta

The Remote Wonnangatta Day Two

We have had other adventures in there such as:

Pack Raft Saves the Day

and Home Made Pack Raft

You can easily spend three days on the section from eaglevale to the Kingwill Bridge. One recent summer we did There are also a number of opportunities to explore shorter sections of this part.

A Wonnangatta Spring

Wonnangatta Spring Day Two

Wonnangatta Spring Day Three

We have canoed the section downstream from the Kingwill Bridge to Black Snake Creek, thence to Hut Creek (Scorpion Track), and thence to the Rock of Gibraltar and Waterford numerous times beginning when our children were tiny tots over thirty years ago – and we are still enjoying it.

Kingwill Bridge to Meyers Flat

Pack Rafting the Wonnangatta

Canoe Wonnangatta

Kingwill Bridge to Black Snake Creek

Black Snake Creek to Hut Creek

Hut Creek to Waterford Bridge

The section downstream from Waterford is much more committing. You could do the run down to Angusvale in two long days but it is better over three. On the third day you encounter a few grade Three rapids including first the Surprise rapid. You will find it at the end of a long, still pool (as most such disasters occur. We portaged around it. there are a couple of others further down where discretion is the better part of valor. there is not much sense in a serious injury so far from help.

Waterford to Angusvale Day One

Ther are plenty of lovely spots to camp.

Waterford to Angusvale Day Two

Waterford to Angusvale Day Three

Again the section downstream from Angusvale is quite committing. You can take two days to the Den of Nargun (if you are pack rafting) but it would be a long way to carry canoes out. It is better to continue on for the third day and exit gracefully at the Glenaladale Bridge.

Marvellous Mitchell Day One

Marvellous Mitchell Day Two

Marvellous Mitchell Day Three

three whole weeks on a crystal clear river wholly within Victoria is pretty special. You would think it would be swarming with canoeists, but though we have canoed it many times we have never encountered another party. Perhaps we are just fortunate. I hope you enjoy your trips on it as much as we have enjoyed ours. I know that if you are there this weekend you may well see us.

21/01/2019: Impact of Bushfires on Wildlife. This is a very distressing video showing how a handful of deer have survived the fire (though far from unscathed) in a tiny area of Vic’s High Country. Just remember there are literally millions of hectares burned just like this. I have witnessed this time and time again, sometimes finding a deep pool in a stream with a dozen dead deer crowded into it by the relentless inferno. There is so little other life which has survived the fire. Even these few deer have a traumatic and difficult time ahead. They have to heal (if they can) and find enough to eat until the bush vegetation springs back into life. Being so big and so tall they have a better chance than most of the native wildlife if it survived this calamity. In the future their greater numbers will cause them to be blamed for the situation the bush will be in instead of forest ‘managers’ who failed to protect it with fire breaks and routine fuel reduction eg by cool burning, logging and cattle grazing, hunting etc: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DegZjlzjYww&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR2GgHs7hgsEXv-sXlwRhq0sX8ylsEsmuSpfqAx1Auu5j5kD92YiL5FfVZY

21/01/2019: Just Wow! Crossing the Atlantic from Greenland to Iceland in a Cessna: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZcdbA1kjpPo&feature=emb_title

21/01/2019: Mark Twain – ‘A Dog’s Tale’. I always thought Jack London’s ‘White Fang’ and ‘Call of the Wild’ were the ‘be all and end all’ of dog books but Twain blows them away. This is the saddest animal story I have ever read. What a writer he was! If you do not burst into tears at least four times in the few minutes needed to read it you have a heart of stone! https://www.gutenberg.org/files/3174/3174-h/3174-h.htm

20/01/2019: Beam me up Scotty: https://www.sciencealert.com/scientists-manage-quantum-teleportation-between-computer-chips-for-the-first-time

20/01/2019: Platypuses are on the 'brink of extinction' - and experts say they'll be almost gone in just 50 years: This could be a little like the 'experts' who 'predicted' that Bumble bees can't fly! I took these photos of a very happy platy during a long walk far up the Wonnangatta-Mitchell River last winter: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/07/30/the-seventieth-birthday-platypus/ This was despite the awful fires there in 2009 which I thought had killed practically everything, and the fires last autumn (2019) which again burned right down to the water's edge (and wiped out four of my camps there) but which seemed to be much less destructive of wildlife (less to burn perhaps). The next fires will oddly have more to burn as last autumn's fires have felled most of the fire-killed trees from 2009 but not been able to burn them as the forest floor fuel had already burned by the time they fell. My thinking is that a 'cool' fire there soonish eg next autumn might rid the forest floor of these logs and make it safer for the surviving wildlife. Birdlife has been coming back (from a low of 6 birds seen in 40 km in 2009). I even saw possums at night last winter near two spots I camped. I haunt this river on which you can have three weeks of wonderful canoeing (a la Huck Finn) beginning at the Humffray confluence: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2017/11/20/pack-rafting-the-remote-wonnangatta/ My latest foray there was just as these awful Gippsland fires were beginning (before Xmas) and so was a bit of a smoky affair: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/12/23/marvelous-mitchell-river-day-1/ PS: I often see platypodes: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7904763/UNSW-researchers-say-platypuses-brink-extinction.html?fbclid=IwAR32ViL7qTIUIOPx7NovUJYCBGfCeMhOmq2_cg908Cs7O6kJWnffh5syh0c BTW: Despite the fires a visit to Gippsland is extremely worthwhile!

Upper Yarra Track Adventures: Warburton to Bairnsdale Ride courtesy of Gerard White. There are many adventures you can have starting in Melbourne and utilising the wonders of the marvelous Upper Yarra Track. As you can see Gerard has just ridden his bicycle all the way to Bairnsdale. You can see the route he used here: Bundoora to Bairnsdale Route.

He has ridden along the Upper Yarra Track from Warburton all the way to Myrrhee then looped around the North side of the Baw Baw Plateau utilising the Thomson Valley Way, then the Tyers-Rawson Rd, then the Cowarr-Rawson Rd. From Cowwarr he was able to utilise the Rail Trail pretty much all the way to Bairnsdale (and indeed Orbost -if he had had time).

An allternative would have been to utilise my Upper Yarra Track Winter Route (search for posts in the search box below) via Tanjil Bren and the Western Tyers to Collins Siding, and Jacobs Creek thence onto the Rawson-Cowarr Rd. This would have been a little less busy – but the Upper Thomson Rd is one of the most scenic anywhere in the world and coasting down it and then down the Tyers Rawson Rd must have been a delight.

Just after Myrrhee (on Gerard’s route) you pass the Block 10 Rd. A km or so down it is the junction with Newlands Rd. The Upper Yarra Track (walking) takes this route. (Here are my instructions for the Upper Yarra Track including camping spots and water availability. Here is a map). It would probably be possible to take a mountain bike this way to Stronach’s Camp but the track is very overgrown from Franjipani saddle to the junction with the Alps track which is a pity as Newlands Rd is perhaps the most beautiful road in Victoria. Anyway as you are going past it anyway you could go take a look. It will never be cleared by public servants so if you have a bit of energy to spare feel free to lend a hand. There ia a delightful camp about a km into Newlands Rd . There is a short side track on your left which leads to a delightful dam with many resident trout.

Day 1 – Warburton to Ada Tree

Day 2 – Ada Tree to Stronach’s Camp.

NB The photos that follow for quite a while of Boundary Rd and the Forty Mile Break Rds show they are absolute scenic delights. They are closed to cars from May to November but a bike should be no problem. There are numerous delightful campsites along the way.

This is Mt Horsefall (around 1300 metres) with a five acre clearing on top and 360 degree views of some of Gippsland’s finest forests.

The photos have jumped here from the Forty Mile Break Rd (near Toorongo) to the Thomson valley Way.

Day 3 – Stronach’s Camp to Heyfield

There used to be a hut at Little Boys Creek up the side track but it may have been removed.

Day 4 – Heyfield to Bairnsdale

PS: With his kind permission I have already brought you Gerard’s account of his Warburton-Walhalla walk along the Upper Yarra Track. (You can find my instructions here and a map here). I will soon be posting sections of his and his friend’s walk along the Alps Walk from Mt Baw Baw to Canberra.

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/06/08/upper-yarra-track-instructions/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2019/06/18/upper-yarra-track-map/

Some other adventures you can have in Gippsland:

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2017/03/12/the-great-gippsland-circuit/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/12/27/gully-walking/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2016/12/06/gippsland-pack-rafting-routes/

20/01/2019: Two things you should notice about this record. First it shows the ‘anomaly’ ie the divergence from the average of temperatures 1979-85 which was the coolest period of the C20th. If the temperatures back to c1920 were included (even with this incredibly enlarged vertical axis), nearly all the so-called warming goes away. Second, you should notice the 20 year ‘pause’ after approx 1998 (until the last big El Nino event - last peak). If you take these ‘distortions out and project the graph on a scale eg which has one-degree steps the line will be virtually flat. We do not have the ability to measure the temperature of the earth to 1/10^th of a degree (as implied by the graph). The ‘error’ of the measurements is more like 1-2 degrees, so that the line would be essentially flat – and nothing could be learned from it. And indeed nothing can. Although we can learn that CO2 has very little if any effect. Relax and have an enjoyable life! (PS graphic ‘stolen’ from Willis Eschenbach: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/19/a-surfeit-of-temperatures/)

20/01/2019: Miniature World made for Snails: https://laughingsquid.com/miniature-worlds-made-for-snails/

20/01/2019: A Very Generous Parrot: https://laughingsquid.com/parrot-shares-food-tokens/

20/01/2019: Gone fishing with goat: https://twistedsifter.com/videos/guy-goes-ice-fishing-with-goat-and-spear/

19/01/2019: Deeply worrying: Chemophobia - Nearly 40% of Europeans Want a Chemical-Free World. Let’s ban dihydrogen monoxide: https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/12/18/chemophobia-nearly-40-europeans-want-chemical-free-world-14465

19/01/2019: It’s not just the China deal; Australia needs its own Donald Trump. Let’s hope Scomo is: https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/washington-secrets/exclusive-trump-list-shows-319-results-and-promises-kept-in-three-years & https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1210703194252357637.html This is what the market thought about Trump’s impeachment: https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/01/markets-surge-to-new-record-on-trump-trade-news-up-nearly-267-points-investors-ignore-crazy-pelosis-sham-impeachment-scam/

19/01/2019: Ultralight Titanium Cards: These little guys are only US$13.95 each from CountyComm (or sometimes available from Drop for US$26 per pair. They weigh only 8 grams each. It is easy to think of a circumstance that you might need one of these. All you would need would be some line (eg from your repair kit) and you will soon have fresh fish for breakfast! Usually I use my own DIY fishing kit which weighs just one ounce (30 grams).

Then again you might have locked yourself out of your house and need a handy set of lock picks!

See:

https://drop.com/buy/maratac-edc-titanium-pocket-tool-cards#overview

https://countycomm.com/collections/tools/products/survival-titanium-fishing-card-limited-run

https://countycomm.com/collections/tools/products/covert-titanium-lock-pick-manipulation-card

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2017/05/10/the-ultralight-fisherman/

19/01/2019:

18/01/2019: Why Iranian women think Julie Bishop is crap: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/01/iranian-pro-women-activist-masih-alinejad-hooks-in-to-julie-bishop-over-hijab-and-bowing-to-irans-re.htmlv PS: We need to move on from those bad old Turdbull days! On the other hand Trump puts Iran on notice in support of the Iranian people: https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/01/president-trump-supports-irans-people-against-their-regime-the-regime-julie-bishop-bowed-to.html

18/01/2019: Before the homogenization, the unadjusted data from 4 of the 6 stations showed cooling: https://notrickszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Kirye_6-stations-in-Australia-NASA-GHCN-V4-Unadjusted-vs-adj-homogenized-2.gif

Environmentalists Caused Australia’s Fires, Not ‘Climate Change’

18/01/2019: No rain ’til April, BOM tells ministers (December 11, 2019): https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/drought-minister-david-littleproud-scuppers-farmer-income-protection-plan/news-story/49ac0e58ec4b0f89b68a76ff3c1edcee I have been relying on the BOM's seasonal 'forecasts' for years. They are always wrong so they can be used for forward planning - just the other way around: eg if they predict a good season, buy hay...It seems highly unlikely that a group of people who cannot get tomorrow's forecasts right, let alone next week's can have greater veracity with forecasts of the century ahead. No-one knows the future. Anyone who claims to is a rascal and a liar. Tarring and feathering is too good for such as them. If you have been concerned by the supposed recent ocean ‘warming’, think again: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/14/the-ocean-warms-by-a-whole-little/ Satellites are giving the most reliable data at present. Some of these other instruments are producing useful data but they are spread thinly, as with surface stations - most of whose data is hopelessly corrupted one way or another. I think the earth's natural thermostats (https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/07/drying-the-sky/) are taking care of any (extra) heat human beings might produce - still inconsequential compared with nature's output eg naturally burning coal seams produce as much CO2 as all human output. That is without considering vulcanism's contributions. Human percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere remains about 3%, unchanged since the 1950s. In every other way the human future looks bright. I just don't understand why people should be making themselves miserable with these 'sky is falling' panics.

17/01/2019: The toxic rhetoric of climate change. Distinguished climatologist Dr Curry argues for a more balanced approach. She is ‘President (co-owner) of Climate Forecast Applications Network (CFAN). Previously, she was Professor and Chair of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Here is a [link] to her c.v.’ https://judithcurry.com/2019/12/14/the-toxic-rhetoric-of-climate-change/ Again from distinguished climatologist Judith Curry: Real science is showing that earth’s sensitivity to CO2 is much less than the IPCC presumed. (They have exaggerated by a multiplier of 2.4 times). Nothing to worry about here. Move on. Move on: https://judithcurry.com/2020/01/10/climate-sensitivity-in-light-of-the-latest-energy-imbalance-evidence/

17/01/2019: Starving to death in China - not such a communist paradise: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-51104313

17/01/2019: It will certainly make hoarding gold more attractive: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-01-13/proposed-cash-ban-is-not-about-controlling-your-money-says-rba/11858104

16/01/2019: Three very interesting new papers from UAH climatologists Profs Roy Spencer and John Christie (and two from Willis). Firstly, the (probably confected) ocean arming is nothing to worry about. Secondly, it seems also that a great deal of the observed (satellite) warming – always less than the surface station records which is so contaminated eg with site location (airports etc) and the urban heat island effect is down to natural processes which of course diminishes the role of CO2 a great deal. Its ‘effect’ is almost certainly trivial (as you would expect from a butterfly) and swamped by water vapor as Willis showed here: http://www.drroyspencer.com/2020/01/new-80-year-deep-ocean-temperature-dataset-compared-to-a-1d-climate-model/ & https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/14/the-ocean-warms-by-a-whole-little/ & http://www.drroyspencer.com/2020/01/1d-model-of-global-sst-shows-40-of-warming-since-1979-due-to-early-volcanic-cooling/ & http://www.drroyspencer.com/2020/01/weak-el-nino-conditions-help-explain-recent-global-warmth/ & https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/07/drying-the-sky/

15/01/2019: "For real people, if something works in theory, but not in practice, it doesn't work. For academics, if something works in practice, but not in theory, it doesn't exist." Nassim Nicholas Taleb

15/01/2019: Wrote this on this day back in 2013 in response to the fires we were having then – have had all this century. Once we used to have (short) holidays on the river over summer, but we are always on ‘fire-watch’ now – and the fires have stolen all the water from the rivers. I would not change a single word of it still, but the urgency has become greater: You would hope that the fires would teach people that the tourism, mining, timber, farming, grazing etc industries know better how to manage the land so that there are commercial livelihoods, needed products and much better protection for wildlife and nature in general. I am totally opposed to National Parks (so too 'aboriginal' land) and would like to see them eliminated - as they produce exactly the opposite result to what is intended: rather than protecting fauna and flora, they are responsible for its widespread destruction. They are intended to ‘save’ that which had already been better saved by many years of the previous management. The land needs to be managed piecemeal, not wholesale. There is no one answer. Drawing vast imaginary lines around an area does nothing to protect it; the reverse is true. Instead, a diversity of land uses produces a diversity of opportunities for nature and leads to no such wholesale destruction as we see happening now, again - to my great sorrow. I would like to see every Greens voter having to go out and deal with fires and the rotting bodies of all the sheep, wallabies, etc which their obsessive policies have killed - much as the Americans forced Germans to deal with the dead and dying of the Death Camps at the end of WW2.

15/01/2019: The rain predicted nearly a fortnight ago (by the GFS) is finally beginning today. Here is another interesting long-range service which seems to have a pretty good track record (Weatherbell). We willl be hearing more about the MJO in future I suspect. It looks like 1-2” all along the East Coast so the fire danger will be mitigated – and the canoeing opportunities may resume (for a short while). See for example my post: Canoeing the Wonnangatta: Catching the Wave (https://www.weatherbell.com/register/pre & http://joannenova.com.au/2020/01/the-cloudless-nw-indian-ocean-may-drive-australian-storms-and-us-cold-weather-in-the-next-month/ & https://www.theultralighthiker.com/?s=catching+the+wave)

14/01/2019: Sleeping Pad News: New pads, new valves from Thermares and a new R-value standard. If It Works, Don’t Fix It – Thermarest’s WingLock™ and TwinLock™ Valve: https://www.thermarest.com/blog/crafting-a-better-valve/ Time to buy a mat while you can still opt for the ‘Classic’ valve perhaps . Extra weight and extra complexity for what? Who found it so difficult to pinch the material behind the valve during inflation to create a one-way valve. Who had difficulty letting a little air out of their mat in the past? The Classic valve is simple and pretty much bullet-proof (though replaceable anyway). Why would you seek to improve perfection?

A few days ago when Thermarest updated the valves across their entire range of of mattress, at the same time they have also increased the R-values for the entire NeoAir range. The new value for our old favourite the Neoair X-Lite Womens at 5.4 is a bit of a surprise . There is now not so much of a jump to the X-Therm (at 6.9) as there was, but it is still almost 2 warmer.

My new Exped SynMat HL Winter M (Now 5.2 rather than 5) doesn't look so good as it did when I bought it - but it is mighty comfortable! If I needed more warmth I should try Exped Ul Downmat Winter M at 480 grams and R = 7.1. You should also look at thickness, width and 'feel' before you make a final choice. Klymit hasn't yet listed their pads' values.

Some Pads and R-values The first figure is the Pre-2020: R-Value the second figure is the new 2020 'ASTM F3340 Standard' R-Value.
Big Agnes Insulated Q-Core SLX N/A 3.5
Big Agnes Insulated Q Core Deluxe N/A 4.2
Big Agnes Insulated AXL Air N/A 3.4
Big Agnes Insulated AXL Trail Boss N/A 5
Big Agnes Insulated Air Core Ultra N/A 3.3
Big Agnes Air Core Ultra N/A 1
Big Agnes Hinman N/A N/A
Big Agnes Two Track N/A N/A.

Exped FlexMat New 1.5
Exped FlexMat Plus New Pad 2.2
Exped Sit Pad Flex New Pad 1.5
Exped DownMat XP 9 (all sizes) 8 7.8
Exped DownMat UL Winter (all sizes) 7 7.1
Exped SynMat UL Winter 5 5.2
Exped SynMat HL Duo Winter 5 5.2
Exped SynMat UL 3.3 2.9
Exped SynMat HL 3.3 2.9
Exped SynMat HL Duo 3.3 2.9
Exped SynMat UL Lite 2.5 2.3
Exped AirMat UL Lite 1.7 1.3
Exped AirMat HL 1.9 1.3
Exped SIM UL 3.8 3.2 3.1
Exped SIM UL 5 New Pad 4
Exped DownMat 7 5.9 5.8
Exped DownMat XP 7 5.9 5.8
Exped SynMat 9 6 5.2
Exped SynMat XP 9 6 5.2
Exped MegaMat Lite 12 5.3 5.2
Exped SynMat 7 4.9 4.8
Exped SynMat XP 7 4.9 4.8
Exped SynMat 3-D 7 4.9 4.8
Exped SynMat Duo 4.9 4.8
Exped DownMat Lite 5 4.1 3.8
Exped SynMat Lite 5 2.5 3.4
Exped AirMat Lite 5 1.7 1.3
Exped AirMat Lite Plus 5 1.7 1.3
Exped SIM 2.5 New Pad 2.8
Exped SIM 3.8 4 4.6
Exped SIM 5 4.6 6.1
Exped SIM Lite 3.8 3.2 3.1
Exped SIM Comfort 5 4.6 4.3
Exped SIM Comfort Duo 5 4.6 4.3
Exped SIM Comfort 7.5 6.4 Incomplete
Exped SIM Comfort Duo 7.5 6.4 Incomplete
Exped SIM Comfort 10 9.5 8.1
Exped MegaMat 10 9.5 8.1
Exped MegaMat Max 15 New Pad 10.6
Exped MegaMat Max Duo 15 New Pad 10.6
Exped MegaMat Duo 10 9.5 8.1
Exped DeepSleep Mat 7.5 New Pad 8.5
Exped DeepSleep Mat Duo 7.5 New Pad 8.5
Exped MultiMat 1.4 1.4

NEMO Switchback UL N/A 2
NEMO Tensor Alpine UL N/A 4.8
NEMO Tensor Insulated N/A 3.5
NEMO Cosmo 3D N/A 3.3
NEMO Roamer SI NA 6
NEMO Nomad Camping N/A N/A
NEMO Vector UL N/A 3.5
NEMO Astro NA 2.6
NEMO Astro Lite N/A 2.6Sea-to-Summit Ether Light XT Insulated Air 3.8 3.2

Sea-to-Summit Ether Light XT Insulated Air Women's 4.2 3.5
Sea-to-Summit Ultralight Insulated Air Women's 3.8 3.5
Sea-to-Summit Ultralight Insulated Air N/A 3.1
Sea-to-Summit Comfort Light Insulated Women's N/A 3.8
Sea-to-Summit Comfort Light Insulated Air 4.2 3.7

Therm-a-Rest NeoAir XLite 3.2 4.2
Therm-a-Rest NeoAir XLite Women's 3.9 5.4
Therm-a-Rest NeoAir XTherm 5.7 6.9
Therm-a-Rest NeoAir XTherm Max 5.7 6.9
Therm-a-Rest NeoAir UberLite 2 2.3
Therm-a-Rest Basecamp 5.8 6
Therm-a-Rest LuxuryMap 6.8 6
Therm-a-Rest MondoKing 3D 11.4 7
Therm-a-Rest NeoAir Camper Duo 2.2 2.5
Therm-a-Rest NeoAir Venture 1.9 2.2
Therm-a-Rest Original Z Lite N/A 2
Therm-a-Rest ProLite 2.4 2.4
Therm-a-Rest ProLite Apex 4 3.8
Therm-a-Rest ProLite Plus 3.4 3.2
Therm-a-Rest ProLite Plus Women's 4.2 3.9
Therm-a-Rest ProLite Women's 3 2.7
Therm-a-Rest Ridegrest Classic 2.6 2
Therm-a-Rest RidgeRest SOLite 2.8 2.1
Therm-a-Rest Trail Lite 3.4 3.2
Therm-a-Rest Trail Lite Women's 4 4.5
Therm-a-Rest Trail Pro 4 4.4
Therm-a-Rest Trail Scout 4.8 3.1
Therm-a-Rest Z Lite Sol 2.6 2

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/06/02/mattresses-i-have-known/

14/01/2019: The Beauty of Volcanoes -Taal eruption in the Phillipines:

14/01/2019: Orange Origami. Astonishing, but don’t make a rod for your own back by showing this to your kids. Toast soldiers are bad enough: http://staff.ustc.edu.cn/~fuxm/projects/Peeling/ & https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/orange-peel-art-japan & https://www.pinterest.com.au/misakobeads/orange-peel-art/?autologin=true & https://ecobnb.com/blog/2013/12/10-ideas-reuse-orange-peels/ A peeled prawn from the artist Yoshihiro Okada.

14/01/2019: Make Way for Tomorrow (1937). What a magnificent film! ‘Orson Welles famously said about Make Way for Tomorrow, "My God! I watched it four times and cried my eyes out every time! That movie would make a stone cry!"’ I did too. Read Mark Steyn’s review here: https://www.steynonline.com/9970/make-way-for-tomorrow then download it from Pirate Bay. Motto: Be sure you own your own home and have enough super!

13/01/2019: Henry Lawson: ‘The Bushfire’ – a true master of words; if it does not have you in tears before the end I will be surprised: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/doomed-planet/2020/01/henry-lawson-the-bushfire/

13/01/2019: Chill out folks: https://www.gizmodo.com.au/2020/01/americans-body-temperature-has-been-dropping-since-the-19th-century-study-finds/

13/01/2019: MH370 Update – some new things we know but still a lot of unknowns: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/07/mh370-malaysia-airlines/590653/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=atlantic-daily-newsletter&utm_content=20200103&silverid-ref=MzcxODQ5NjM5NDc1S0

13/01/2019: Terrible News for Conservatives: Sir Roger Scruton is Dead: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7196653/SIR-ROGER-SCRUTON-battled-Thought-Police-Iron-Curtain.html

13/01/2019: Automatic Chicken Door Opener: What a great idea this is - and only A$34.99 on eBay. I will certainly be getting and installing one. Of course foxes can strike during the day too - but so often it is because you are late home or have forgotten to lock the chooks up. I will be teaming this up with my fox-proof fences to try and ensure that we can have a few hens again in a soon-to-be-restored poultry facility.

There is some debate about what type of chooks we should get. the traditional chooks on this farm (for the century before we owned it were White Sussex, do that is tempting. then there are Australorps, the only authentic Australian breed. Araucanas with their coloured eggs are a temptation too, but we have had Rhode Island Reds before and would like to have them again. They are a charming breed with lovely brown eggs. I think we already have names for them. My grandson is going to really enjoy going up to the chook house to collect the eggs. I can hardly wait either - but back to the door opener...

‘Automatic Chicken Coop Door Opener - Light Sensitive or Timer Operation.
Never forget to lock the chooks up again and losing your flock to foxes!
Easy to install and set and forget.
Has four modes for you to choose from:
1/ Set time to open and Set time to close.
2/ Set time to open and Automatically close at Sunset
3/ Automatically open with the morning light and set time to close
4/ Open Automatically at sunrise and Automatically close at sunset
Flexibility to suit every need.
Features:
Operates on light sensitivity or Timer
Will lift a door .03kg to 1kg
Weather Proof
Runs up to 1 year on 4AA Batteries (included)
Comes with Aluminium Door and Rails
Four operating modes
Comes with instructions
Australian Made
Comes with a 30-day satisfaction guarantee, just return it within 30 days if you are not completely satisfied’

I will probably try to include a solar charger to the battery set-up so that they never run flat - and I will afford some quality batteries to run it - like these Enerloops.

I will also probably add another idea to my new chook house, a 'fox-proof ladder' just as a further safeguard. I am so over having my beloved hens (and other critters - especially lambs!) destroyed by Brer Fox.

I will have the chickens entering and leaving their house higher up than a fox can reach. The chooks will have to hop up a wobbly 'ladder' made of a single length of 2" plastic pipe with 1" plastic pipe rungs pushed through it about every foot. A hen will easily learn to hop along up it, but a fox ought not be able to climb it! Photo to follow.

Door Opener available on Ebay here.

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2015/04/01/eneloops-rechargeable-batteries/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/03/23/brer-fox/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/05/06/hello-possums/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2015/04/01/vermin-proof-fence/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/07/06/wildlife-proof-fencing/

https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2018/08/03/poachers-moon/

A PS: The Ring-Tailed Possum have moved into the Macadamia trees with a much larger nest - boy how they will boom when I get that vermin-proof fence finished this summer!

PPS: I have borrowed the pics. I hope the seller doesn't mind. I hope to help them sell a few more openers after all!

12/01/2019: Naturehike 1000fp down 174 gram jacket with 70 grams of down fill, only US$65: https://www.theultralighthiker.com/2020/01/12/how-good-is-this/

12/01/2019: Socialism is hardly opposed to anti-semitism. Remember the Hitler’s National Socialists and Stalins communism: https://forward.com/opinion/438029/the-new-socialism-like-the-old-will-not-protect-jews/

12/01/2019: Members for Warringah:

12/01/2019: There is hope. Rain is coming. Next 4-8 days; Tip: Watch Wednesday. GFS have had 37 here for that day and this morning have 52mm: https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/bushfires-hazard-reduction-plan-ignores-black-saturday-inquiry-targets/news-story/410a06f04403175565a7beab20ba550b?fbclid=IwAR0zmyb6mT1NCYsKoE2mVUThere is hope: http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/watl/rainfall/pme.jspqVGUA50ROnjC4WkBOnJm6JtPZoKLDQdnpup64

12/01/2019: Trump is arguably the greatest President ever; he is certainly the most entertaining for a long while (since Ronald Reagan) – and the crowds love him: https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/01/trump_wows_the_crowd_at_toledo_rally__and_takes_no_prisoners.html

11/01/2019:

11/01/2019: Bushfire of the Vanities: Great Read. ‘The plain fact is, as anyone who lives outside the cities knows, Australia has been turned into a flammable death trap by green ideologues indulging their Thoreauesque fantasy trip that nature is too pure and special to be managed by man. How ironic — a point I made in the title of my book Killing the Earth to Save It —that their benign neglect just leads to even greater destruction.’ The Spectator

11/01/2019: The ABC is just awful, so dreadfully biased. It really should be abolished/privatised: https://quadrant.org.au/opinion/media/2020/01/whip-me-abc-thrash-me-again/

11/01/2019: Saint Greta the Shrill becomes a joke: https://pjmedia.com/instapundit/354183/

11/01/2019: Western Civilisation Responds; Good point Roger Kimball: ‘In July 55 BC, in the midst of his campaigns to civilize Gaul, Julius Caesar was troubled by the Germans. They would cross the Rhine, wreak havoc, and then disappear back across the mighty river, whose depth and swift currents made the Germans regard it as an impregnable barrier. To teach them that it wasn’t, Caesar had his engineers construct a bridge across the Rhine. As Caesar recounts in Book IV of his commentaries on the Gallic War, they did this in an astonishing 10 days. Caesar and his troops crossed over, stayed for a few days in German territory, ‘burned all their villages and other buildings, and cut down the grain in their fields’. They then crossed back over and destroyed the bridge. The point, which was not lost on the Germans, was that the Romans could go anywhere they wanted, whenever they wanted, and there was nothing the Germans could do about it’. https://spectator.us/elimination-qasem-soleimani-farewell-letter/

11/01/2019: To Hell With the Perpetually Offended: https://www.takimag.com/article/to-hell-with-the-perpetually-offended/

10/01/2019: A large group of new arrivals to the Pearly Gates was stirred up by a man in a white lab coat with a stethoscope hanging around his neck. Pushing his way through the crowd, he gave St. Peter a stern look and whooshed through, unimpeded. Turning back to the crowd, Pete rolled his eyes. "Sorry folks," he said. "That was just God. He thinks He's a doctor."

10/01/2019: ‘I used the wrong tactic. I should have told Congress I didn't want a wall. Then they would have built one right away.’ Pres. Trump to Rush Limbaugh yesterday.

10/01/2019: So Iran shot down the Ukrainian passenger plane. They have too long been state terrorists, and must be curbed: https://www.sbs.com.au/news/australia-canada-receive-intelligence-blaming-iran-for-deadly-ukrainian-plane-crash & https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/01/defense-secretary-esper-attack-soleimani-was-planning-against-americans-was-just-days-away-video/ & https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/01/08/right-strategy-iran-isnt-regime-change-its-regime-collapse/

09/01/2019: What the President said about Iran. Go Donald! https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2020/01/president-trumps-remarks-on-iran.html & http://catallaxyfiles.com/2020/01/08/soleimanis-assassination-and-its-aftermath/ More Iranians than Democrats dare to criticize Iran and support President Trump: https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/01/democrats-defended-soleimani-life-and-death-daniel-greenfield/ & https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/01/thanks_to_trump_the_fortyyear_appeasement_of_iran_is_over.html

09/01/2019: Willis makes another genius discovery about how the (water vapor) greenhouse effect works. Pretty much completely nudges CO2 aside. Wonderful! PS: If you do not understand the article, you are not entitled to believe in AGW: https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/07/drying-the-sky/

09/01/2019: No-one can predict the future. This is one of the truest sentences ever uttered. Certainly doomsayers are particularly bad at it (fortunately): https://www.foxnews.com/us/top-5-most-outrageous-2020-doomsday-predictions & https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/01/08/the-climate-decade-that-was-failed-predictions-tour-de-paris-and-the-gretas/

09/01/2019: The Science & Australian Bushfires. Nothing to do with ‘climate change. I will let you guess who is lighting them. PS: What a whopper of a bushfire year 1974-5 was: http://www.drroyspencer.com/2020/01/are-australia-bushfires-worsening-from-human-caused-climate-change/ & http://joannenova.com.au/2020/01/the-information-war-about-arson-figures/ & https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/01/police-working-on-premise-that-arsonists-started-bushfires-in-australia-200-people-arrested-so-far-85-of-fires-blamed-on-humans/

08/01/2019: Hundreds of Millions of Animals Have been Kil